EU demands taxing the wealth of the rich

At a time when the world’s economies are betting on multiplying subsidies and raising rates to face the crisis, the European Union (EU) has asked to discuss, within the G20, to be organized next November, a new annual tax of 2% on the great fortunes.

The message is clear: the rich must pay more. According to the report on tax evasion prepared by the Fiscal Observatory of the European Union (EU), taxing the world’s largest 2,756 billionaires would generate an income of US$250,000 million and would help in the fight against shell companies that they use to not declare.

For EU economists, billionaires operate “at the limit of legality” because they can avoid paying their income and make contributions that barely figure between 0% and 0.6% of their assets. The strategy involves creating companies in holdings in order to transfer the dividends of their shares between their own accounts.

In contrast, between 20% and 50% of EU citizens’ income is diluted annually in taxes. It is estimated that the personal tax of billionaires in the US is close to 0.5%, but it reaches almost zero in France, a country where the tax burden is high.

“To date no serious attempt has been made to address this situationwhich risks undermining the social acceptability of existing tax systems,” said Gabriel Zucman, director of the EU Tax Observatory.

The 2% now applied to assets, and not to income, would continue to be modest, since, in addition to having a limited universe of taxpayers, the wealth of millionaires has increased at an average of 7% annually since 1995, discounting inflation.

These statements come amid a request to reform the agreement signed in 2021 between 140 countries (including Peru) to tax a minimum tax global 15% tax on multinationals that launder their income in tax havens, which has been “weakened” by legal maneuvers during its implementation.