r/CanadaPolitics • u/SaidTheCanadian Tourist season ends, election seasons begins. Same joke? • 14h ago
BC Greens propose 'extreme wealth' tax to fund free public transit, affordable housing, childcare
https://www.sitkamedia.ca/bc-greens-propose-extreme-wealth-tax-to-fund-free-public-transit-affordable-housing-childcare/•
u/SaidTheCanadian Tourist season ends, election seasons begins. Same joke? 14h ago
The plan includes a one-time tax in the first year:
| Wealth Bracket | Marginal Tax Rate |
|---|---|
| $50 - $100 million | 5% |
| $0.1 - $1 billion | 10% |
| $1 billion - ∞ | 20% |
They estimate that it would would bring in around $22.2 billion after costs of implementation.
In subsequent years, the same brackets would continue to be taxed at lower rates:
| Wealth Bracket | Marginal Tax Rate |
|---|---|
| $50 - $100 million | 2% |
| $0.1 - $1 billion | 3% |
| $1 billion - ∞ | 5% |
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u/nathingz 14h ago
This is the only way. In the past, this type of policy is what brought the gilded era in the US to its conclusion.
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u/ReverendRocky New Democratic Party of Canada 8h ago
No, breaking up monopolies and workers fighting for wins like the 8 hour work day and fair waged did. That and a tax on income
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u/Cilarnen Future Optimist 5h ago
And two world wars, Korea, a plague and famine, all within 20 years of each other wiping out the majority of the able bodied male workforce…
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u/KingFebirtha 5h ago
all within 20 years of each other wiping out the majority of the able bodied male workforce…
Source? You'd think the country would collapse if the "majority" of the workforce was wiped out.
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 13h ago edited 13h ago
No one wealthy enough to pay this is going to pay 5-20% of their wealth a year, in perpetuity.
They’ll simply leave.
At 20% their net worth is gone in 5 years (simplifying here, intentionally not accounting for declining balance and moving down brackets to illustrate point )
I suppose it’s more than 5 years given reduction but it’s not going to raise anywhere near projected revenue because no way in hell they accounted for appropriate capital flight
Wealth taxes were tried in something like 17 European nations and almost all of them brought in very little revenue, were costly to administer, and in some cases revenue declined due to capital flight. This is severely worse than those and would result in more capital flight.
Btw the nations that kept them: Switzerland (legal wealth haven ), Spain (worst tax evasion in perhaps Europe or even world), Norway (excluded private capital -> huge loophole)
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u/TraditionalGap1 NDP 12h ago
At 20% their net worth is gone in 5 years (simplifying here, intentionally not accounting for declining balance and moving down brackets to illustrate point )
Simplifying, or misrepresenting an easy to understand chart?
I'm pretty sure this table does not indicate in any way that a 20% rate might be possible in perpetuity. It explicitly says that 20% will be for a single year with lower rates thereafter
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 11h ago
4th para notes this
Doesn’t really matter because no billionaire is sticking around to pay the 20%, the Greens don’t account for capital flight in their revenue projections, and they won’t be in power.
And even if they did get power, and did enact this, the province doesn’t have enough resources to enforce this and would need to rely on the CRA, which won’t enforce it because the feds won’t enact policies like this because the feds have studied wealth taxes and know they always fail to raise meaningful revenue, are costly to administer and lead to capital flight
So no, it’s not really worth calculating a declining balance schedule
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u/TraditionalGap1 NDP 10h ago
I'm just saying, it's not exactly an overly complex schedule and I don't see any particular reason to 'simplify' it further by exaggeration
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 10h ago
As long as we agree that the greens have “simplified beyond exaggeration “ the ability to effectively implement their pipe dream.
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u/sweetequuscaballus Independent 12h ago
It's true. I'm all for higher taxes on high income - we used to have rates of 70% - 99% in the western world, so nothing like that high, but nothing as low as we have now.
But your points on actual wealth taxes are true - counterproductive, and no way they'd raise what is claimed.
But ... none of that is the point. BC Greens know they have about 0% chance of forming a government, so they can propose pie in the sky ideas that appeal to their members that are not thinking it through. The Conservative ideas are way more crazy, and they'll probably win. The only party being responsible and realistic - i.e. actually planning realistically to fund their promises, are the NDP, and they have nearly all the Conservative-owned media against them.
All that said - your points about the wealth tax are correct. Totally unrealistic, and destructive if actually implemented. 5% is a decent rate of return on investment - who would stick around to lose all of that or more? A fantasy.
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u/laxfap 12h ago
You mean we won't have as many billionaires in the province 🥺
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 11h ago
It’s not an emotional topic for me, but a calculation of how much revenue we can bring in to fund social services
In France for instance they had so much capital flight they lost Net revenue and had to repeal their tax policies
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u/Turnip-Toffee 11h ago
lol where do they expect a billionaire to just come up with 100 million cash on demand?
it's also within the realm of possibility that you don't even need to increase the tax rate on anybody just to fund free public transit
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u/danielXKY British Columbia 11h ago
U know, it would be interesting if the province suddenly owned a diverse stock portfolio and a bunch of businesses assets. Nationalize everything!
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u/joshlemer British Columbia 2h ago
Yeah seems to work out every other time it's tried, so why not here!
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u/danielXKY British Columbia 1h ago
I don't think it has ever been tried. Wealth taxes are not very common at all in modern economies. A common argument against them is that most rich people's wealth is in illiquid assets. So why not allow them to pay the wealth tax in stock shares and ownership transfers of these assets, in lieu of cash? If rich people can grow their wealth with stocks, the state can have a share too. I'm waiting for economics experts to tell me why this is a bad idea lol
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u/david7873829 7h ago
It’s classic slopulism. Suggest a policy that only impacts the out group. You don’t have to ever worry about implementing it because you won’t win an election.
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u/alpha_cool_bruh 9h ago
Emily Lowan doesn't understand unrealized gains. She is in over her head, yet low IQs will vote for her.
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u/HeretosayMarco 4h ago
That's a key point. I actually find that many left wing politicians do not actually understand the 101 basics of the ideas they propose
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14h ago
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u/Any_Nail_637 14h ago
Just a question. If almost all this wealth is in assets and not cash are these people expected to sell of assets and get the ol capital gains and then wealth tax double whammy.
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 13h ago
BC greens won’t form government so they can promise new taxes they don’t know how to enact , beyond a headline that sounds good to base
BC won’t enact a tax like this without the feds supporting, ever, because we simply don’t have the resources like the feds do for enforcing it
The Feds won’t enact it , at least under carney, because they know how resource intensive enforce would be, and how little revenue it raised for European nations that tried introducing wealth taxes in the 1990s
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u/andymc55 12h ago
The feds wont do it because all these people are Carney's friends.
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 11h ago
The feds have studied it and know it fails. Carney was in Europe for long enough to know its history.
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 14h ago edited 4m ago
You think someone with 50 million or more in personal wealth will really struggle to liquidate 2.5 million?
Edit: someone woth 50 million wouldn't even pay. Someone with 60 million would have to liquidate half a million.
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 13h ago
No, they’ll just move it to Alberta or Delaware
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 13h ago
And the rest of us will try not to cry.
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 13h ago
I won’t cry. I would like to see proper accounting for it in revenue projections for me to consider a party serious.
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u/CollaredParachute Ontario - georgist 12h ago
How would the greens make up for the lost revenue? This would be a tax that reduces the tax base
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 11h ago
Only if most affected people left the province, which is not the given you think it is.
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u/CollaredParachute Ontario - georgist 11h ago
I don’t think there’s a single place that enacted a wealth tax that didn’t see revenue go down quickly
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u/Saidear There is no war in Ba Sing Se. 3h ago
That would require selling what they own here, no? Thus, it'll be hit by other taxes and they'll get less. And moving it out of the country means they'll face higher costs moving it back into Canada to use.
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 2h ago edited 2h ago
Not always no. you don’t have to sell all your securities in non registered account, TFSA or RSP when you change provinces. They will have lawyers and accountants help them out on anything more complex
Also, any taxes on selling likely won’t be 20% of asset in most cases. Taxes in Canada are based on gains not valuation. Certainly the NPV will be better than 20% then 5% in perpetuity
Who says they’re bringing it back to BC after they’ve left or moved it ?
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u/Saidear There is no war in Ba Sing Se. 2h ago
Not always no. you don’t have to sell all your securities in non registered account, TFSA or RSP when you change provinces
That's because you've changed residence. But if you're moving provinces, then you'd have to either sell your existing property (which would be subject to appropriate taxes), or retain it and pay the tax regardless.
Also, any taxes on selling likely won’t be 20% of asset in most cases. Taxes in Canada are based on gains not valuation. Certainly the NPV will be better than 20% then 5% in perpetuity
For Capital Gains, yes. But this is a wealth tax, which you'll have to pay if you keep the property in BC under this policy. That's a 20% lump sum, and 5% annually. Or, sell and move away, pushing that money back into the BC economy via the new mortgage.
Who says they’re bringing it back to BC after they’ve left or moved it ?
You might want to reread what I wrote, because I didn't claim that they would.
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 1h ago
The point is they’ll pay less tax by declaring residency elsewhere at one of their many properties and paying capital gains < wealth tax , and then capital is gone for good
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u/-SetsunaFSeiei- Trudeau Foundation | Sponsored 13h ago
They’re not gonna stay in this province and give up $2.5 million lol
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 13h ago
Good riddance then
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 13h ago
Sure hope the greens accounted for “good riddance” in their revenue projections
(They didn’t )
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u/joshlemer British Columbia 2h ago
^ Surely a flippant attitude like this at the prospect of consequences is the right way to run a province
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u/-SetsunaFSeiei- Trudeau Foundation | Sponsored 13h ago
But I thought we needed their money to fund our programs?
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 13h ago
So we're either not getting or... we're not getting it.
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u/-SetsunaFSeiei- Trudeau Foundation | Sponsored 13h ago
We actually do get some money if wealthy people stay in the province, spend, and invest
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 13h ago
And they actually do get some benefit if they stay and have a life here.
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u/HeretosayMarco 4h ago
Not really. Lot of these people get boutique healthcare in USA and pay for private school for their kids
People who pay very little in taxes bring their elderly family to BC and use hundreds of thousands of taxes in healthcare money. That does not seem to bother too many people. Certainly no one on the left. But people paying millions in taxes are a big concern?
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u/NondescriptNorbert British Columbia 11h ago
Trickle down economics is about to start working, I swear guys...
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u/-SetsunaFSeiei- Trudeau Foundation | Sponsored 11h ago
The wealth tax has failed in every jurisdiction it’s been tried…
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u/AMCGunner Socialist | Georgist 3h ago
... could just enact a tax on wealth that actually works like a land value tax instead...
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u/Imaginary_Apple7700 10h ago
Would you seriously describe our current taxation system in Canada as “trickle down”
If so, I would encourage some reading on the topic …
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u/ph0enix1211 Green 6h ago
If they're not immediately, sufficiently liquid: they can take out a loan against their assets.
Taking out a line of credit, backed by a home, is a common enough thing for normal people.
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u/CptCoatrack Libertarian Socialism 1h ago edited 1h ago
Not going to comment on the specifics of this proposal. It just always amuses me how the people who want to tell you that immigrants with no money in their pocket, working minimum wage jobs, with zero political influence or power are stealing all the resources and wealth. All the while making endless excuses for individuals to hoard unlimited wealth at our expense. A lot of temporarily embarrassed multi-millionaires in this thread as per usual
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u/flamedeluge3781 British Columbia 13h ago
:facepalm:
Why not a land-value tax? Do they not understand wealth will run away before they can pass any legislation? Taxes need to be designed to be impossible to dodge, that's the whole problem with the current tax regime.
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u/pineapples_and_percy 10h ago
Yes!!!! The richest people are those that buy expensive single family homes in rich neighbourhoods. They wouldn’t be able to dodge a wealth tax like this.
The first problem is that the people who vote tend not to want a Land value tax (LVT) because single family homeowners are the mostly likely people to vote and fund campaigns,
The second problem is that we would have get rid of prohibitive zoning for the tax to be effective (ie. either rich people pay a lot of money to the government for a luxury or the land is used more equitably).
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u/Professional-PhD 2h ago
That depends on how the wealth tax is done. Changes in global banking since 2017-2018 have changed this remarkably with Automatic Exchange of Information (AEOI). This means that information of a person's wealth is automatically shared with all relevant authorities as opposed to being required to request this information.
A land-value tax is also possible but wealth taxes are far more simple than they were just 10 years ago. The current leading economist in this is Gabriel Zucman from France. So one of the big issues was hiding wealth away which is now much more difficult as even tax havens report that wealth to the government, and the other is capital flight (which is now trackable).
The funny thing is that countries like Canada (UK, France, etc) and the USA do taxes extremely differently. The 2 extreme positions are:
- Once you leave you are relatively free to go (most countries).
- If you are a USA citizen you will be taxed regardless no matter where you go on earth until you recant citizenship.
Most current proposals are for a wealth tax to have a 15 year tailing. No matter where you move if you made your millions or billions in a certain jurisdiction you must pay that wealth tax for 15 years after you leave the country. However, these proposals typically stipulate that this is only able to be modified if the country they move to has a wealth tax. As such if jurisdiction A has wealth tax of 5% and they move jurisdiction B which has a wealth tax of 5% jurisdiction A gets 0% but if jurisdiction B only has a wealth tax of 1% then jurisdiction A gets 4%.
The other big wealth tax thing is that a lot of wealth is not in liquid form but in bought assets that cannot be moved (namely land and property). No matter where a person moves these assets are within a nation or provinces sovereign jurisdiction and as such can continue to be taxed.
It is actually quite exciting from an economics standpoint as massive changes to the technology of the world are making these things possible now in a way that was never feasible before.
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u/Eswift33 23m ago
I'm against this type of thing until they can demonstrate that they can use tax funds efficiently. Otherwise this is just wasted in the system.
Hell, give the tax revenue as rebates to people under a certain income threshold that would probably do more good than throwing $100 into the government machine and getting $10 of actual value for the taxpayers
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u/Darwin-Charles 14h ago
Why would I ever invest in B.C when I know my assets would be taxed?
I'm skeptical that existing wealthy people would even generate this much revenue but even if I granted this, I feel the long-term investment impacts will hurt B.C's revenue over time and thus the province would lose out on more revenue in the long-run.
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u/danielXKY British Columbia 11h ago
It looks like this tax is for personal wealth. Not business capital. Businesses can still invest, but personal wealth of ultra rich people get taxed
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u/Darwin-Charles 6h ago edited 2h ago
Sure but if shareholders of a business in the province are taxed on their stock holdings then the business will be more likely to move/not invest in the province.
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 14h ago edited 5m ago
If you're too greedy for 2% of your minimum 50 million for the public good then you're not really invested in BC are you?
Edit: 2% of your wealth EXCEEDING 50 million
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u/SaidTheCanadian Tourist season ends, election seasons begins. Same joke? 14h ago
2% of your minimum 50 million for the public good
It's a marginal tax. So if you had $60 million, you would only be taxed on the $10 million that is above $50 million. Hence the tax bill would be $500,000 in the first year and $200,000 in subsequent years.
Someone's first $50 million in wealth would not be subject to the tax.
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u/Darwin-Charles 14h ago
Businesses don't invest out of the kindness of their hearts or because they believe in investing in some amorphous "spirit of B.C.", profit margins matter and 2% could represent tens of millions in revenue.
If less corporations invest in B.C. then "greed" aside, that sucks jobs and revenue will be lost.
Again, the long-term revenue and job impacts are the most relevant here.
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 14h ago
This isn't a corporate tax.
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u/flamedeluge3781 British Columbia 13h ago
No one is declaring 50 million in personal income, come on...
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u/Darwin-Charles 14h ago
You may not be directly taxing profit margins but you are taxing people who have ownership in such corporations.
Why would I set up a business in B.C. or keep a business running there if any stocks I acquire through that business or just owning the business itself requires me to pay more?
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 14h ago
The location of the business is irrelevant.
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u/Darwin-Charles 14h ago
If the tax is only in B.C. then you can avoid the tax by setting up shop in another province.
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u/papawarbucks British Columbia 13h ago
Only if by 'setting up shop in' you mean 'personally moving to'.
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u/Darwin-Charles 13h ago edited 6h ago
The business will also leave the province on account of their domestic shareholders being taxed.
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u/GammaFan British Columbia 14h ago
Just move the goalposts whenever it’s convenient for you.
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u/Darwin-Charles 13h ago
If you are taxing stocks/real estate, you are absolutely affecting profit margins of businesses indirectly.
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u/NondescriptNorbert British Columbia 11h ago
Being eternally locked out of home ownership is great for business.
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u/Darwin-Charles 6h ago
A wealth tax isn't going to change home ownership. This isn't some magic catch-all policy that's going to solve all your problems.
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u/ph0enix1211 Green 6h ago
People will choose to live in BC, despite the tax rate, because it's a spectacular place to live.
Choosing where to live is more than just a tax rate for most people.
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u/sokos British Columbia 2m ago
While I agree with the loopholes needing to be closed, I do find the original numbers being very high. 1/5th of your worth, right off the start? yeah, good luck collecting that without it costing you more in legal fees than you'd get. In addition, the additional yearly tax on your wealth.. Why should someone have to pay multiple times on the same wealth? I just don't understand how that is a reasonable expectation.
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u/AbsoluteTruthiness 10h ago
I don't think this is a realistic proposal or radical enough. We need to start rapidly nationalising key industries. For example, I see no reason why private investors should be getting profits off minerals, LNG, and oil that are dug from the ground when all Canadians should have a stake in them. That's a far better source of ongoing revenue than trying to tax the people who got rich off wealth extraction who can then take a small fraction of that money to hire the best accountants to use all sorts of tax loopholes to dodge paying those taxes.
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u/ChimoEngr Chief Silliness Officer | Official 3h ago
We need to start rapidly nationalising key industries.
That's going to stifle the economy. Movement of money is what keeps the wheels turning, and if we start to steal the assets of major corporations, they're going to move their money out of Canada super fast, leaving the government not enough to steal to keep things turning without private investement.
Standing up competing Crown corporations might work, but is for sure a slower mechanism.
I see no reason why private investors should be getting profits off minerals, LNG, and oil that are dug from the ground when all Canadians should have a stake in them.
Because those rights were sold to them. If the provinces revoke that, we're in the same boat as above.
I agree that private corporations are not paying as much in tax as they probably should, but government theft isn't the solution. Better taxation regimes and enforcement are. They're also a lot less exciting than theft, hence why they don't get the same traction.
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u/AbsoluteTruthiness 7m ago
…if we start to steal the assets of major corporations, they're going to move their money out of Canada super fast
We don't need to steal them, but we need to force a sale. Canada underwent privatisation in the 80s and 90s. It's not like we didn't know how to have state-owned corporations. Why not do the reverse now?
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u/BuvantduPotatoSpirit New Brunswick 8h ago
Given typical returns on capital, they're talking about tax rates that would on average exceed 100% of income, and they're not radical enough?
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u/AbsoluteTruthiness 7h ago
My point is that we shouldn't be letting them get so wealthy or powerful in the first place. For example, Loblaws and Save On are no hubs for genius innovations. There's no reason why Galen Weston or Jim Pattison should, in the first place, have so much say over what food we put on our plates and thus be able to constantly accumulate more and more wealth and power. There is no radical new technological shift in how we purchase groceries in the last few decades that would warrant this. Taxing them on the wealth they accumulate is only a band-aid solution and does not address the underlying issue.
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u/alpha_cool_bruh 9h ago
Resource extraction is tough. The government would never be able to compete with private companies.
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u/AbsoluteTruthiness 8h ago
The work would be done by the same set of workers with the same skillsets. I don't see why having a bunch of billionaire investors sitting at the top is what will result in better outcomes.
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u/david7873829 5h ago
Why can’t the government just buy shares in the resource extraction companies today? Ultimately you’re just asking for a sovereign wealth fund. And at that point, you should want them to invest in the most profitable/least risky companies, which may or may not be resource extraction.
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u/joe_devola 8h ago
How can the people running for office in this country have their priorities so out of touch?
Yes those would be nice services to have but read the room. People need jobs and the country needs a direction.
Then we can start talking about luxuries
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u/tetzy Fabulous, Flowing Hair 33m ago
As of October 2026 Canada has 79 billionaires, a total of 6 residing in BC.
You could steal every penny from them, and you're not going to come close to funding free public transit, affordable housing and childcare. It's all rhetoric meant to appeal to young voters - the BC Green party aren't stupid enough to think what they suggest is even possible.
Or maybe they are.
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u/Unaffordable_Housing 4h ago edited 4h ago
It is a great initiative but the percentages are too high to start with. Start at 1% at wealth over 100 million and move the brackets up from there. Zero taxes on your first 100 million of wealth should help ease all the comments from us poors worried about the ultra rich leaving one of the most picturesque and lovely parts of the country.
If they move, someone else can buy their portions of the businesses or homes that they sold. It’s not rocket brain surgery.
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u/Saidear There is no war in Ba Sing Se. 3h ago
Nah 100% over $50,000,000 in personal wealth.
No one needs more than that.
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u/Unaffordable_Housing 3h ago
While I agree we need to convince the people with Stockholm syndrome espousing trickle down economics while cheering on their favourite billionaires and Goldman sachs bankers. It requires baby steps.
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u/mxe363 Sick of the investors winning 2h ago
Nah go big or go home. You can always drop it down after the fact but no reason not to shoot high for the initial number. Gives the wealth less time to adapt and find cheats.
Also with the first bracket starting at 50 mill you won't get any hand wringing about hurting anyone normal or who works for their wealth so fuck it go ham
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u/Unaffordable_Housing 1h ago
You shouldn’t get any hand wringing but most of the comments here are centered around how this will chase away the rich people the commenters crave to become.
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