America's Top Billionaires to pay Billions under Ultra-Millionaire Tax

Ultra-Millionaire Tax is a wealth tax that is introduced for the richest people in the U.S.A. It is a new bill that is introduced by Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. She has been proposing to introduce this for a long time.

Senator Elizabeth Warren introduced the Ultra-Millionaire tax with Representative Brendan Boyle of Pennsylvania And Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington. The main aim of the new bill is to fight for wealth inequality in the country.

The wealth tax would force the American households whose income is more than $50 million to pay taxes.

Lets dive deeper to understand what is this tax all about

Who is this Tax for
Evasion Methods
Reasons for this Tax
Amount Owed by the Rich
FAQ

Who is this Tax for

The American households whose net worth is in-between $50 million and $1 billion will have to pay a 2% wealth tax. For example, if the household is earning $50 million then they will have to pay $100,000 in the form of wealth tax.

The American households whose net worth is more than $1 billion will have to pay a 3% wealth tax. For example, if the household is earning $2 billion, then it will have to pay $60 million in the form of wealth tax.

The households earning below $50 million will not come under the tax bracket. 0.05% of the American households will come under the proposed tax bracket according to a press release.

Evasion Methods

The Ultra-millionaire tax has anti-escape measures been taken under consideration. The country will invest an amount of $100 billion to strengthen the IRS (Internal Revenue Service) who is responsible for collecting the taxes. There will be a minimum of 30% audit rate for the taxpayers who are responsible for paying the wealth tax.

If the U.S citizens who have an income of more than $50 million would want to leave the country or move their assets and citizenship to another country, then they would have to pay an exit tax of 40%. There would be penalties implements for underpayment of the wealth tax.

Reasons for the new Ultra-Millionaire Tax

The main reason for the implementation of the new bill is to reduce the wealth inequality in-between the American Households in the country.

Let’s take an example – consider two people A and B. A’s father is a millionaire with an income worth $50 million, pieces of jewelry, collectibles, and yachts. A earns an income of $50,000 and B comes under the American household who earns an income of $100,000. B’s income is also $50,000.

But even though A has a lot of assets and income generated in his family he will have to pay the same amount of tax that B is paying. Increasing the income tax would affect B more than that of A and that is why the wealth tax is implemented.

Wealth tax is calculated based on the entire income of the family and not just an individual.

According to an analysis conducted by economists Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman from the University of California-Berkley, The American wealth of the richest that is 0.1% of the population has seen their income triple from 7% to 20% in the years 1970-2016 and the rest of the 99.9% has seen a decline in their share of wealth from 35% to 25% in the years 1970-2016.

The richest families of America are 13,000, they have the same amount of wealth as the rest of the 117 million families in the country. According to their study, they’ve found that the top 0.1% pays around 3.2% of their income as taxes while the bottom 99.9% pays around 7% of their income as taxes.

Amount Owed by the Richest for Ultra-Millionaire Tax

According to the Tax rates which is proposed by Elizabeth Warren, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos will have to pay $5.7 billion as a wealth tax for the year 2020. Jeff Bezos would still have $185 billion in net worth after paying the tax.

Tesla’s Elon Musk will have to pay $ 4.6 Billion as a wealth tax for 2020. Elon Musk would still have $148 billion in net worth after paying the tax.

Microsoft’s Bill Gates will have to pay $ 3.6 billion as wealth tax for 2020 and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg will have to pay $3 billion as wealth tax for 2020.

According to a survey conducted by CNBC on Millionaires, it was seen that around 60% of the millionaires support the wealth tax proposed by Elizabeth Warren.

FAQ

How many billionaires are there in India?

There are 177 billionaires in India as of 2020.

Who is the richest billionaire in India?

Mukesh Ambani is the richest billionaire in India.

Who is richest woman in India?

Roshni Nadar Malhotra with a wealth of ₹54,850 crore is the richest woman in India.

Conclusion

According to Elizabeth Warren, the implemented wealth tax would raise around $3 Trillion in 10 years. It is said that the tax would raise around 1% of America’s GDP in a year. The revenue would help in paying for child care, developing the educational infrastructure, developing nursing home cares, tuition-free public colleges and schools, and promoting clean energy in the country.

Elizabeth Warren has said that implementing the wealth tax will help in raising money for President Joe Biden’s agenda '#BuildBackBetter' which includes policies like expanding the caregiving economy.