(Paris) Several international organizations, including the NGO Oxfam and a group of philanthropic millionaires, are proposing a tax on the richest people on the planet that would lift billions out of poverty and immunize the planet against COVID-19.
Posted yesterday at 7:25pm.
As billions of people struggle to survive during this pandemic, the fortunes of billionaires are spiraling out of control. “This can’t be fair,” Jenny Rex, global coordinator of the activist movement Coalition Against Inequality, one of the group’s member organizations, said in a statement.
On Monday, an Oxfam report showed that the ten richest people on the planet, including Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, saw their wealth double to $1.5 trillion within two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. An increase in the share prices of companies in which they are shareholders.
Along with the Coalition Against Inequality, the NGO Oxfam, the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies and National Millionaires, an organization for wealthy Americans, are also taking part in the call announced on Wednesday.
This group proposes creating an annual tax of 2% for people over $5 million, 3% for assets over $50 million and 5% after $1 billion, which would generate $2,520 billion each year.
This collective sum shows that 2.3 billion people will be lifted out of poverty and all people on the planet can be vaccinated against COVID-19, while many countries are now showing hopelessly low levels in vaccination rates, especially in Africa.
This grand prize will also provide universal health coverage and social protection for the 3.6 billion people living in low- and middle-income countries, the group says.
A higher tax of $50 million would raise up to $3620 billion a year, but Jenny Rex told AFP that choosing a lower level of tax was more “realistic”.
These proposals coincide with the traditional annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, in Davos (Switzerland), which is being held online for the second year in a row due to the Omicron variant.
In an open letter to forum attendees, more than 100 millionaires, including members of national millionaires, said Wednesday that the current tax system is “unfair.” “Every country in the world should ask the rich to pay their fair share,” the letter read. “Tax us the rich and tax us now.”
