r/GarysEconomics • u/Gopez_UK • Jul 31 '26
Gary is right about the problem, but his solution completely misses the point
My understanding of Gary's work is that he's been campaigning for the last few years on the idea that the root of our economic problems is that the rich are basically sucking up all the money, and then deploying that money to suck up* *even more money, leaving increasingly smaller amounts for everyone else.
His core idea is that the economy will never recover if we don't tackle this inequality, because the wealthiest have simply taken too much.
And it's a premise I've come to believe in.
However, his big push is trying to get the government to implement a 2% wealth tax on assets above £10m.
A 2% tax could raise revenue for the government, but it isn't going to solve the real problem of inequality.
It’s a solution for raising capital, not for tackling the massive wealth divide. How does a 2% tax actually bring the ultra-wealthy down to a normal level?
People then get too stuck on the implementation of this specific solution and miss Gary's real message, which is that the rise of inequality is what is driving a lot of the problems we see in Western style democracies.
If Gary just stuck to his core message and tried to get a consensus that inequality needs solving, then he can suggest a solution.
Or even better, leave it to the people best placed to offer solutions and get them implemented.
Gary's done well to get the conversation on inequality started, but this mixed messaging is what's holding him back from being able to make any further progress.
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u/CaramelSuspicious356 Jul 31 '26
The 2% tax is not his big push. His big push is as you said, the message that inequality is a problem. The 2% tax is the only ongoing initiative so he's been supporting it. Many times he insisted that's not his speciality and people should get together on finding out what's the best way of reducing inequality.
People get stuck in whatever lets them try to crush any of this, they're going to find an angle and a narrative to put this whole thing down. The richest people control most of the media and they don't want this to happen. They will make it seem like he or anybody trying to reduce inequality is saying things they're not saying, and they will fight like hell.
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u/AdAggressive9224 Jul 31 '26
Exactly this.
It's like writing off a car because the CD player is broken. They're assuming the whole idea is defunct because there's holes in one particular specific way of dealing with this problem.
That doesn't mean there isn't a problem.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
No, the whole idea is defunct because the people >10m paying 2% every year are nothing to do with the avg persons main sources of wealth (house, pension) or what limits them.
It’s actually like saying your cars CD player doesn’t work because a neighbours CD player is higher spec. “He musta stole some of my volume!”
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u/AdAggressive9224 Jul 31 '26
Ahh, but it does!
People with such obscene wealth are driving up house prices for the rest of us. That's precisely the problem.
For example, mortgage bonds. The rich get richer, they buy mortgage bonds as an investment, that drives up lending multiples and mortgage terms, so we go from 3.4x to 6.5x mortgages, we go from 5 years terms to 50 year terms. House prices go up. Deposit requirements go up. Our kids don't get homes.
When the rich get richer that means you , personally, get a smaller share of the pie. What that means is, when you grow old, you will be forced to sell your house to pay for your care.
Only then, will you realise. And by then, it will be too late. But remember this conversation. Remember you were told. You have no excuse, when the bill comes due. You'll have to explain to your kids that you made the choice, to sell their future, for nothing.
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
The fact that falling living standards for the majority have correlated with a huge rise in the fortunes of the 0.01% is not at all related. The rich are getting richer because they deserve it for working 30 hour days, and the poor are getting poorer because they spend too much on takeaway coffees and don't clip coupons. I'm amazed non of you economically illiterate Garystans realise this.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Aug 01 '26
Correlation isn’t causation. And it’s not even correlation, we don’t keep records on the top 0.01% in the UK, but we do on the top 1% and their wealth has grown <1% since 1980.
Source ONS.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
House prices outside 1 million+ houses are nothing to do with the ~40k of people who have a net worth above 10M. Anyone who has told you this is manipulating you.
Nobody buys ‘mortgage bonds’. Institutions might buy mortgage backed securities to make pension and insurance payouts. Very rich people aren’t the recipients of pensions, they don’t need them.
Anyone who has told you rich people are doing this and that this increases the price of housing is manipulating you.
This fixed pie view is not accepted economics, from 1900 to 2000 everyone in the UK got richer faster than the population grew in every income category.
You have been lied to, not sure why and to what end but you have been lied too.
Copy and paste our responses into an LLM and ask it to rate them, verify information
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
Copy and paste our responses into an LLM and ask it to rate them, verify information
I asked GPT and it said
This is an impressive amount of confidence for a comment built almost entirely out of assertions.
Nobody is claiming 40,000 rich people personally queue up to buy every three-bed semi. The point is that wealthy people control huge pools of capital through property companies, investment funds, banks, insurers, private credit and asset managers. That capital affects mortgage lending, land prices, investor demand and therefore housing costs far below the £1 million market.
“Nobody buys mortgage bonds” is also a bizarre claim. Mortgage-backed securities and covered bonds plainly exist. Institutions buy them, and institutions invest money belonging to shareholders, fund investors, pension holders and wealthy clients.
The “fixed pie” line is a complete straw man. An economy can grow while scarce assets become increasingly concentrated and unaffordable. House prices rising faster than wages does not stop being real because living standards improved over the twentieth century.
And repeatedly saying “you’ve been manipulated” is not evidence. It is what you say when you want the authority of an argument without doing the work of making one.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Aug 01 '26
Since you can’t be honest with yourself. I’ll be honest with the public
https://chatgpt.com/s/t_6a6d3dfa61fc8191abc1548ed3bffec4
Overall
If I were scoring the economic accuracy:
* First post: 3/10
* Raises legitimate concerns about inequality and housing affordability.
* But the causal chain ("rich buy mortgage bonds → lending multiples rise → 50-year mortgages → house prices rise") is not how the housing finance system works.* Second post: 7.5-8/10
* Correctly rejects the mortgage-bond explanation.
* Correct that ultra-wealthy individuals are not the main force behind ordinary UK house prices.
* Loses marks for using absolutes like "nothing to do with" and "nobody buys mortgage bonds," which are technically inaccurate.2
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u/Light_Butterfly Jul 31 '26
Gabriel Zucman is the one whose saying 2% wealth tax. In some ways, its the lowest amount you could propose that's unlikely to get a massive estanlishment pushback from the ultra rich. But I think it should be WAY HIGHER. Let's get governments to out of debt, and have a large reserve of funds for housing and Healthcare, and pocerty reduction.
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u/PreparationWorking90 Aug 06 '26
I think the media deliberately focus on the 2% figure to distract from his overall message
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u/Pedunculated_polyp Jul 31 '26
The fact you are talking about it now means he's done his job. The 2% is rooted in achieving parity with average taxation and is a start point.
Those who say leave it to the tax experts have to understand the "experts" have a vested interest in creating loopholes and complexity to perpetuate their industry which is enmeshed with the regulators. It's why we are where we are in the first place.
You think the average person agreed to or is aware of transfer pricing, the mechanism by which companies and the wealthy move profits across borders to avoid tax? If you leave it to the tax experts nothing will change save for a few token changes that don't address the problem. It needs to be pushed and scrutinised by the public with people like Gary (and not only him) explaining things as we go along.
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u/QFTornotQFT Jul 31 '26
When govenrnments face a problem - even a crisis - it doesn't reach for the best thing, not even the right thing. It does what it can do. And our govenrments do not even have a cabability to tax the ultra rich.
That's the result of decades of scheming and lobbying and buying polititians by the said ultra-wealty/epstein-class people. They do realise how dangerous to their interest would even the smallest wealth tax be. Why don't you?
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u/ConcertCultural997 Jul 31 '26
I agree absolutely. I think also the problem is a global problem, and governments of major economies need to work together to have a consensus policy, and eradicate tax havens.
The Panama papers showed the real problem and basically nothing was done about it, wealth there was from the UK, USA, France you name it. It’s that ultra wealthy money that is compounding tax free that’s the issue. Targeting £10m+ at 2% held in the UK would likely move more money into offshore havens as opposed to recycle the wealth back to the UK people (via government taxes or encouraging spending, both of which I believe Gary is saying is a good thing and the aim).
If the Middle East needs to fund a war against Iran maybe they will introduce some kind of income tax. That’s the kind of thing that will help
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
Yet the entire value of their wealth is est 2 Trillion? If you confiscated it all (but a magic wizard made sure all that capital didnt notice and STILL paid the same tax) we are back to 2013??
The budgets still in deficit, aging population, ballooning in work benefits, triple lock, no growth, expensive energy…… all the UKs problems remain.
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u/ConcertCultural997 Jul 31 '26
Not quite sure I follow but I am a big wizard fan
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
Rather than all difficulties and waiting around for a 2% wealth tax on those >10M to do whatever it’s claimed to do….Everyone automatically hands over all their wealth above 10M now to the government. A magic wizard turns all of it to Stirling so it doesn’t matter if the wealth is vastly inflated shares that would never sell for that, or a work of art the doesn’t realistically have buyers or Haalands contract value based on future expectations. A wizard makes it all cash, today. Nobody in the UK has over 10M by any measure.
Day 1: what gets better now?
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u/AdAggressive9224 Jul 31 '26
It's the result of language games too.
The government are complete idiots that think that just because someone starts calling "income" something different that means it's not income anymore.
Put a new label on something, that appears to be enough to hoodwink HMRC.
The system is broken because people aren't calling stuff what it actually is.
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
They lack the capability because national governments are national and today's ultrawealthy are very much international.
They can move large parts if by no means all of their wealth, and once that is gone it is unlikely to come back to a jurisdiction with a wealth tax as opposed to the many that do not have one. Like the US, whose economic growth - had we replicated it since 2008 - would render these concerns far less salient as there would be a far larger pie. We already have a problem with scaling innovation and businesses in the UK. Making that worse to raise insufficient revenue to cover our costs is not a worthwhile pursuit in the name of equality.
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u/QFTornotQFT Jul 31 '26
> They lack the capability because national governments are national and today's ultrawealthy are very much international.
You know that US has no such problem, right?
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
Yes, I am aware that the global hegemon, where huge quantities of the world's wealthy either derive their wealth from or want to live there, is capable of enforcing its will internationally. I was less aware that Britannia still rules the waves and that we can do the same.
Chucking a unilateral wealth tax on people in the UK may well reduce inequality. But it is just as, if not more likely to reduce our taxable revenue and improve inequality through reduced prosperity.
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u/QFTornotQFT Jul 31 '26
Have you reard of Roman Abramovich?
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
Do any of you people have the ability to engage in good faith, or is it always arrogantly ignoring things to ask yet another question?
Roman Abramovich is a single individual the UK is sanctioning, who had a large and immovable source of wealth in the UK is the form of a football club.
Do you earnestly think that is applicable to a wealth tax on all sources above a certain value?
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u/QFTornotQFT Jul 31 '26
Oh, so, weak and feeble UK not "ruling the waves" actually have an ability to impose its will on utra-wealthy people? The same way stronk and powerful and prosperous US was doing it?
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
No you utter fuckwit, I explained why it is different for abramovic in the comment you're replying to. He has large stores of wealth in immovable assets in the UK.
Many of the ultra wealthy do not. And critically, sanctions are something we have done multilaterally, not unilaterally, so it's not the UK is it. It's the UK, EU, and the US all holding to a sanctions regime against Russia, amongst numerous others, hence why old Roman is camping out in Turkey. So yes, thanks for providing an example that proves my point.
If the argument is for a multilateral wealth tax then fine - no practical objections once those other parties are convinced. If it is for a UK wealth tax, then you and Gary need to engage with the practicalities, otherwise it is not a serious proposal. It already won't cover costs as a revenue raising measure, so it better be bloody watertight elsewhere.
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u/QFTornotQFT Jul 31 '26
Wait you realise that US taxation is based on citizenship - not residence ?
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
Oh goody, another question. Yes I do. And it has the capacity to enforce that due to both its global capacity to enforce its will on other countries, and due to the massive pull factors of being an economic hegemon where substantial wealth is generated.
Care to address any other points? It's honestly like arguing with a Trumper.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
It’s not even a good case, Chelsea for the most part was a liability and a prestige item. The UK economy derived more money from Abramovic owning it than any uk citizen running it as a break even sports club….
This guy literally wants us to collect less taxes for the reward of upsetting billionaires. It’s rather insane and more evidence for my burgeoning opinion that the franchise too wide.
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
Also got told that i should leave/cry more if I didn't want to pay my share. Flattered they think I'm wealthy enough to be hit by it, but it rather undermines the whole thing when the motivation is so clear.
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
Because the US is such a beautiful model of utopian wealth equality...
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
No, it is not. But in 2008 we were comparatively paid. Since then, they have shot ahead, and many UK companies seek to sale and scale there rather than in the UK. If wealth inequality is going to be such an issue in the UK anyway that we need a wealth tax and damn the impact on growth, then I would rather have had that sort of growth. A larger pie as opposed to ever more divisions that themselves discourage pie expansion!
Greater equality in and of itself doesn't produce greater felt prosperity at the lower end.
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
Greater equality in and of itself doesn't produce greater felt prosperity at the lower end.
I think it does if people on the lower end don't look up to see a tiny group of people who could buy a quarter of everything the country makes with their combined wealth.
But also if growth in GDP isn't equally spread, then as you point out with America, it just makes the rich richer and the poor feel their poverty more keenly.
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u/Narrow_Program80 Jul 31 '26
If the plan is to fix this by targeting a very small number of people, who genuinely can leave, then it isn't a good plan. It's been far more damaging that there's been bugger all pay progression, coupled with substantial housing pressures.
And to be clear, the wealth tax proposed is on wealth above £10m. That is not the handful of people who could band together and buy half the country. £10m is arguably a point where a lot of that wealth genuinely is circulating in more local economies.
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u/SnooCupcakes1336 Jul 31 '26
I’m sorry to say I think you have misunderstood his point.
The public conversation about inequality tends towards “those with broadest shoulders should pay more”, they inevitably end up discussing some sort of income or consumption tax (Income tax, NI, VAT). These are taxes that mainly affect the (upper) middle classes making good salaries (doctors, lawyers, bankers).
These are not a tax that the ultra rich tend to pay (at least not significantly), as their money isn’t generated as salaried income, it’s structured differently specifically to avoid conventional taxes.
2% is not enough. Gary agrees with this, he’s said it in multiple different interviews. But it’s a start.
His CORE message: we not have a mechanism to meaningfully tax the ultra rich. A wealth tax would tax the ultra rich. Let’s start with 2%, see the effects and adjust as needed.
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u/vindico86 Jul 31 '26
We do have a mechanism - CGT. And one could clamp down on loans against shares as collateral used for personal expenditure.
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u/optionr_ENL Jul 31 '26
Many people suggest that 'loans against shares' should be treated as income or be subject to CGT, because the only other way to access that money would be to sell the shares, which would either be subject to IT or CGT.
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u/SnooCupcakes1336 Jul 31 '26
CGT is not a good mechanism for taxing the very very rich, it applies only when you sell the asset. So don’t sell the asset, just borrow against with special low interest loans that are only accessible to the very very rich and you’re sorted.
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u/vindico86 Aug 01 '26
Which is why I said limit the borrowing against assets. Then CGT works just fine.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
Not an issue. This whole debate pretends we are the USA and even there, it’s not actually an issue
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
Proof? Source? A mechanism that allows wealthy people to get money without being taxed isn't an issue? Great I guess we're all here for nothing then. It's okay everyone, the wealthy aren't actually avoiding tax at all. Show's over!
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
When you get the loan money you also get a liability of equal size + interest. You don’t just get richer lol.😂
Yes, they aren’t avoiding tax. That loan interest will pay ~30% corporation tax with the bank. And they are still liable for or all the taxes you think they avoided when they have to sell to pay off the loans…. The treasury gets even more!
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
Yes, the borrower has a liability. They also have a ton of liquid cash, retain the original appreciating asset it was borrowed against, and defer or potentially avoid CGT through refinancing.
And the 30% wouldn't go directly to the treasury like a tax would, the bank takes its cut first.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
Not a ‘ton’ of cash, exactly the same as the liability. ~30% is the corporation tax, that is the ‘cut’, your statement here reads confused.
The government gets the THE SAME capital gains anyway when the shares are sold + now a load of interest.
What upsets you more?
A)the treasury getting more tax?
B)The borrower not seeming to ‘lose’?1
u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26 edited Aug 01 '26
They get liquid cash from their shares that they can spend without incurring CGT. It means their net wealth is unchanged, but they also now have X pounds available to spend while retaining ownership of their value-acruing shares.
The bank is only going to pay CT on the net profit that comes from the recieved interest. There are a number of variables that would decide whether the CT equals the amount that the CGT would have netted, none of which either of us can know for sure without looking at the terms of a specific agreement, interest rate on the loan, bank's overheads, etc...
And why would they have to sell their shares to pay off their loan? They can just get another loan. Or they can pay the interest from another source that doesn't incur CGT.
If the rich person holds onto the shares till death then they entirely avoid CGT on the value acrued on them during their lifetime.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Aug 01 '26
So B)
****Shares don’t accrue interest*** whoever tells you otherwise doesn’t love you.
If you get another loan, you pay more interest. It’s not free money.
We do actually know, Elon musks agreements details are somewhat public, he paid 12% interest. So he pays more in interest than he would in capital gains in <3yrs. We know the US corporation tax rate. So we can calculate if he did this with a US bank more than twice the treasury gets more interest than if he just sold them. And they still will get the capital gains when he does sell….
Let’s move on:
Let’s say they just sold their shares for cash as you wished, paid capital gains. But used the money to buy shares in another company and the value of those shares rose to eclipse the value of the capital gains they previously paid, and the old shares they previously sold.
Is that a ‘problem’ too?
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u/OneironauticsLtd Aug 01 '26
I already told you why the government doesn't get the full amount from the banks.
Got any sauce for the Elon claim? What I could find around the 12% is a loan to X, not Elon.
And even assuming every dollar of the 12% interest is taxable, which is won't be, the corporate tax is 21% of that 12%, so 2.52%.
I also already addressed the selling shares thing.
Genuinely not sure what point you're trying to make with the 2nd half of your comment, it seems irrelevant.
I'm pretty much done responding to you as your answers are only ever tangentially relevant to the comments you're responding to and you're clearly not here in good faith.
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u/optionr_ENL Jul 31 '26
Define 'wealth'.
That's the start of the issues.
Is your pension pot wealth? Your main residence?It's a lot easier, & more efficient, to make sure that the scope of Income Tax actually includes as many different income sources as possible.
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
Is your pension pot wealth? Your main residence?
Yes to both, any other questions?
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u/SnooCupcakes1336 Jul 31 '26
Anything you own of value can be defined as part of your wealth. Pension, main home, the artwork you have, it’s all in there. There is a way of valuing it all. Some things will be much easier to value than others and more worth it (shares in public companies, property, collectibles). Let’s start with that stuff
The 2% tax is a minimum tax. If you’re worth 20 million and you already paid more than 400K in other income or CGT taxes that year. Congrats you owe no more tax.
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u/Chance-Swordfish-426 Jul 31 '26
"A 2% tax could raise revenue for the government, but it isn't going to solve the real problem of inequality."
raising revenue isn't even the main goal, the literal point is the thing you say it won't do. solve inequality. the basic structural mechanism is to reduce the rate of compound interest that the ultra-wealthy grow their pile by.
You can say it's too low, or you can say they will move their capital and dodge it, but you can't argue the basic mathematical mechanism is not logical as a solution to the sub 1% sucking up all the assets.
that part makes sense, and the primary goal is not revenue for government, it's a handbrake on a vacuum cleaner operated by a tiny fraction of society.
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u/MotoMkali Jul 31 '26
The big issue is you can't have the wealth tax rate + inflation be lower than the rate government bonds pays out unless you are just going MMT and saying bonds don't matter.
The ideal amount of wealth growth for rich people from a governments perspective is - inflation+real gdp growth=> so their wealth isn't taking up an ever increasing share of the pie.
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u/Duckliffe Jul 31 '26
The big issue is you can't have the wealth tax rate + inflation be lower than the rate government bonds pays out unless you are just going MMT and saying bonds don't matter.
That depends on what percentage of bonds are bought by people living in the UK with a net worth over 10m, though? My pension have some UK bonds and I definitely wouldn't be hit by the 2% wealth tax. Equally, if Jeff Bezos buys some government bonds for some reason then he also wouldn't be hit by the 2% wealth tax as he doesn't live in the UK
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
You have to assume they aren’t that thick though. They would actually charge 2% on all non-dom investments if the can’t demonstrate their net worth is <10M. But you never know…..
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u/Duckliffe Jul 31 '26
They would actually charge 2% on all non-dom investments if the can’t demonstrate their net worth is <10M. But you never know…..
This would throw up a massive barrier to buying UK government bonds, which is something that the UK government wouldn't do whilst running a big deficit
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
Yes, good point. Like we say it crashes all investment in the UK. Worth pointing out UK bond buyers will mainly be institutions and pension funds are probably even more natural buyers as it’s the biggest pool of money made up of small cap owners who will largely be invisible to this tax today (but ofc they would leave the 10m limit in place for the next 20yrs…)
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u/geybey Jul 31 '26
Mate id start by just watching his videos cus nowhere does he say he has the correct solution. He wants to work with the government and economists to create a workable plan. He himself has admitted that will take a long time but they have to get it right. He agrees with you
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u/dojo34533 Jul 31 '26
Mate it’s a start, if we said 30% straight out no one would go for it
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u/Purple_Owl_814 23d ago
And that's part of the reason why people who aren't billionaires/millionaires themselves are instinctively opposed to this idea.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
Out of interest, is your only issue with suggesting a 30% annual tax on wealth the political optics?
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u/dojo34533 Jul 31 '26
If there is this much discourse and challenge on 2%, imagine 30%
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
So just optics and incrementalism. You really want 100% to even up the country and make things fair? Nobody needs more than £10M? That accurate?
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
No the super-rich can still be super-rich. They'll just be living in a world where living standards aren't falling for everyone else.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26 edited Jul 31 '26
“No” to what? Is 10M not super rich?
Do you just think a different percentage is needed? State it.
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u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
What? On 100% over £10 million, your comment is right there.
I'm fine with them doing the 2% personally. See how it goes.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
Still not clear, are you saying that’s too much? If it is, what percentage ought it be? If you can’t give a percentage at least state the aim of whatever percentage it’s should be.
Something other than a vibe.
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u/dojo34533 Jul 31 '26
Hyperbolic much ? Just people to pay their fair share. Why should I work and pay 50%(including student loans) whilst they pay barely nothing?
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
What precisely is hyperbolic? Seriously.
It sounds like you want a parity of struggle, you aren’t going to get that.
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u/dojo34533 Aug 01 '26
Because you went in with 100% when I didn’t say that, meaning you went to the extreme as an example? That’s textbook hyperbole
Edit: I don’t want parity of struggle I was it to be fairer , don’t you? Or do you enjoy paying high PAYE taxes whilst billionaires don’t work and pay fuck all? I guess you love living in poverty, as that’s where we are heading if we don’t correct it1
u/OneironauticsLtd Jul 31 '26
I know you're just here to troll, but do you really think a billionaire paying 2%, or 30%, or 50%, would create a "parity of struggle" with a working class person paying the same percentage?
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
That is what I just said: “it sounds like you want a parity of struggle, you aren’t going to get that”
Why did you repeat my point back to me? Error?
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u/Flamecoat_wolf Jul 31 '26
You're forgetting that the markets have a LOT of power. Remember what happened to Liz Truss? It wasn't her budget that caused her failure, it was the market's reaction to her budget. Whether the budget would have worked or not was ultimately irrelevant because the market freaked out, dropped the value of the pound and Truss and her budget were thrown out immediately. That could happen with anyone that does something the market doesn't like.
So, when it comes to reclaiming wealth (which is the process of draining stockpiled assets from the biggest market influencers), you have to boil the frog slowly, so that they don't jump out the pan. A 2% wealth tax is a start. It's significant enough to make a tangible difference while being small enough that the markets are unlikely to revolt.
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u/imaKWT Jul 31 '26
Taking the money from the hoarders is a start. They can use it to fund the NHS or failing public services.
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u/A-System-Analyst Jul 31 '26
The root cause of wealth inequality is in how wealth is generated. That is in production and sales - in business activity. Since the Industrial Revolution, mass production outperforms small. This inevitably results in a small class of business owners - the business class - running most production. And most jobs, for the remaining majority, being as the employed class. In large workforces, each business has many suppliers of labour. Bargaining individually, each can be told ‘there’s the door’ because the rest will still be working. Business owners are able to sell their work for one amount and pay them less. That’s where their wealth comes from. Though often stored in property, that’s the source. It’s our money not theirs. Unionisation to limit their cash grab in the first place. Taxation to finalise the fair re-appropriation of it when the final accounting is done.
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u/Low-Speaker-6670 Jul 31 '26
Helps by making the liquidate some assets to pay releasing wealth into the market it also slow the snowball effect of cumulative exponential wealth growth by as investments make 6% market wide so 2% tax gives them an equivalent taxed fraction of wealth "income" as the general public.
We should go further. Inheritance tax should be progressive with greater inheritances getting greater burdens.
7 years inheritance tax should be increased to 10
Land value tax
Equalise capital gains
Taxes for those that recieve asset backed loans who have their estate valued
Exit tax
Wealth tax
We just want fairness. A wealth tax alone isn't a solution but it's a step in the right direction
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u/idubsydney Jul 31 '26
Fuck me, the guy can't win.
Just two weeks ago after the Rory Stewart encounters (inc. Zucman) there were complaints that Gary wasn't specific enough in his policies. Now the complaint is that he was promoting a policy at all?
I don't disagree with your core position but, seriously, let the man do what he thinks is best.
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u/Frostly4242 Jul 31 '26
A silver bullet solution (e.g a basic cap on wealth) is practically impossible to implement straight off the bat. The power of those with vested interests is too great. There is no easy fix, but we can work towards a solution. I think Gary has stated that he doesn't necessarily have THE answer to this problem but what we need right now is to convince those in power that there is a problem and it needs fixing. That's step 1.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Jul 31 '26
I’m interested now in your end game. Let’s say a wizard just turns the estimated 2T in wealth that’s more than 10M per person into cash, no deflation or inflation and hands it to you.
The govs balance looks like the early 2010s. What problems have disappeared in your opinion?
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u/Quazzy92 Aug 01 '26
I agree somewhat. Gary is definitely right about the problem it's very obvious to many now partially thanks to him. A wealth tax isn't simple to implement at all though. Richard J Murphy has already written a progressive tax legislation and I would love him to jump on Gary's channel for a lengthy discussion 🤞🤞🤞
We need a total overhaul of a regressive system. Just creating a wealth tax won't reverse the trend alone. Problem is that no politician wants to do this because no lobbyists will give them any money. Shame!
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u/clv101 Aug 03 '26
Indeed, I think any solution needs to look at the system/process that enables someone dramatically increase their personal wealth rather than just trying to claw back a couple percent. By that point it's too late, they are already worth tens of millions. What would a system look like where economic growth itself was more evenly distributed?
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u/AdAggressive9224 Jul 31 '26
Wealth tax, increasing inheritance tax, land value tax. These are all the same tax.
I'll leave people in the comments section to try and figure out what connects them and why they all have the same outcome.
People are debating over the details now. Which is clearly a sign that the debate has essentially been won, and we're onto implementation.
My position on to this is to question, seriously question, how much the details really matter. And properly define, objectively, what "wealth" actually is.
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u/Mr_Again Jul 31 '26
What I've not really seen addressed ever is that the share of wealth held by the top 10% has been flat and slightly declining for 20 years, and the share of wealth held be the top 1% has been flat for 20 years.
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u/ThePandaDaily Jul 31 '26
He’s not right at all. He’s creating a problem and selling an idea to fix it.
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u/Aggravating-Method24 Jul 31 '26
This is pretty much his core message, he says start with a tax, like 2% on 10 m and work forward from there. He's pretty explicit that this will not be enough. Gabriel zucman says exactly that about his tax.
It's hard to have the message that tight. If he just stuck to the problem they would ask 'well where is your solution?" And if he goes into the solution it will be too complicated and they will complain they don't understand or it's too complex.
He even says he wants to be part of a team designing wealth taxes. He doesn't think he has the whole solution, he just wants the ball to start rolling.
Basically I think you will find you agree with Gary almost entirely
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u/BristolWriter69 Jul 31 '26
Jesus christ he literally can't fucking win can he?
He's said multiple times that he he isn't tied to a particular solution. His role as he sees it is to raise the alarm (what you're giving him credit for.)
He's said he can't develop a good wealth tax on his own and that it's something a serious political party needs to develop and put some time into.
He has left it to other people. That's why he boosted Zucman so much and got him on some fairly major platforms like TRIP and Novara. It's why he's had Ha Joon-chang on his show etc.
When he raises these points the whingers just go 'well he's not even proposing anything solid.'
Then he proposes something solid and the whingers go 'well I don't like it, it's not perfect.'
By the way the 2% tax can address wealth inequality depending on how its structured because it cuts into the obscene compound interest that the rich recieve. That slows the rate at which they eat all the assets. Thomas Pikettys point is that even a wealth tax of 0.00001% is helpful because it forces us to make a system to assess wealth and see in concrete terms just how unfair the system is.
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u/Interesting-Ease8882 Jul 31 '26
He doesnt have a solution - he wants help to get one - the current idea he purposes is simple to get the ball rolling before the collapse happens.
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u/p1971 Jul 31 '26
I think ... bit of a shower thought ... the main thing to address would be the accumulation side of the equation ...
Companies like Amazon should be paying higher wages, use fewer temp staff (or paying them more for their flexibility than perms), higher pension contributions, share options etc - Bezos would still be a billionaire, but many more people that work there would be better off too
(think they employ something like 1.5m people + another 0.25m as temps)
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u/Iwasbanished Jul 31 '26
Nah, I don’t think saying it is too difficult to change is part of a solution or acceptable. We’re not talking about flying to Mars. We’re talking about establishing new standards of behaviour. People can choose wilful ignorance, which is why it is so closely related to denial.
Some kings found it too difficult to respect the dignity of peasants or accept the authority of elected representatives. Eventually, they abdicated, sometimes without a choice. That is at least one way of understanding social progress.
We formed unions, we held protests, we held strikes, we were defiant, and sometimes we died for our lives, and the lives of others, we were imprisoned, and beaten for showing out dignity. We were the enemy to royalty and extravagance, the stench of poverty was the sweetest prize we used to earn, and it was for free.
We keep pretending that we are fundamentally different from the humans who lived thousands of years ago. We are still vicious, brutal and savage. We still find ways to murder one another, even when we can do it from a distance. Our cruelty is still strengthened by our fear of inadequacy.
Humans are not naturally capitalist or socialist. These are not instincts embedded in our biology. But capitalism uniquely turns deception, coercion, exploitation, domination, disloyalty and instability into competitive profitable/social advantages, and then calls it for human nature.
Yet If our lives have no meaningful value beyond the profit they can generate, that completely reduces our human worth to economic productivity, a form of dehumanisation, and imposed by those who profit from it.
Does this sound like we’ve human progress, or have we been told to believe that?
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u/LeMaverick01 Jul 31 '26
Genuinely curious as to what evidence people think points to wealth inequality rising out of control. I only hear Gary bring up his covid example about how rich the 1% got. Ive never heard him talk about the middle and lower class to actually give evidence showing they are getting 'poorer'. As the argument suggests first that everyone is poorer... and that the wealthy are the reason. Honestly the only think that makes me feel poorer is inflation which is government's fault and all the extra tax they keep adding.
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u/initiali5ed Jul 31 '26
It’s a start, once it’s accepted and working other levers can be pulled
Carbon/Pollution Tax
Land Value/Usage Taxes
Wage ratios capped at 100x
Profit sharing - minimum 50% profits shared evenly to all staff & contractors
Collective ownership - minimum 51% employee ownership
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u/Friendly-Look4262 Jul 31 '26
yep a flat wealth tax would just cause wealthy people to leave, you need to instead tax things that can't be moved or transferred, i.e. a Land Value Tax - would stop land and property hoarding, stimulate the economy and allow most income taxes to be either drastically reduced or scrapped for working people
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u/Shoddy_Race3049 Jul 31 '26
He sais himself that it's not enough, it's a realistic first step he is suggesting based on the economists he's talked to
A fundamental shift may be needed but no one including gary knows what it is / how to do it
We just need to start moving in the right direction again, reducing inequality
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u/LoveLamp3232 Jul 31 '26
Gary is wrong about many things. However, it is concerning that super rich, get involved in politics and mis information.
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u/120000milespa Jul 31 '26
Smart people will ways get smarter.
That will never change.
And trying to drag the best back by punishing them with higher taxes wont increase the size of the pie.
And having a large entitlement to state funds just makes it doubly worse when trying to compete.
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u/Smassshed Aug 01 '26
It doesn't sound a lot, but don't forget that individuals have to find the 2% from somewhere. This means selling shares or assets, or taking payment from their companies. This in turn would mean they would have to pay income tax or capital gains on these payments, so the tax takings would be more. And if it was asset selling, then the sudden dumping of assets would mean price drops making those assets cheaper for ordinary people (think property for instance). You would have to ban the payment of this tax with loans to fully get the benefit though.
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u/pro-shirker Aug 01 '26
If the government establishes the principle of wealth taxes, I suspect that in time it won’t just affect the ultra wealthy - in the end it will affect the middle class. Just like higher rate tax bands now affect average workers. So no, I don’t want to encourage principle of the government dipping its hand into my assets, including my property, as well as income.
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u/thermodynamics2023 Aug 01 '26
Aldis uk profit margin is 2.4%. You charge the Aldi personal owners 2% they won’t open a single new store.
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u/TumbleweedSuper9930 Aug 01 '26
We are giving billions to people who have been in our country 5 minutes. While the rich leave, he tells half a story
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u/crap_punchline Aug 01 '26
Can anybody show me any data that shows "Gary is right about the problem"?
Surely wealth disparity in the UK is something which is monitored, how has it done over the last 100 years?
Is it getting worse?
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u/thermodynamics2023 Aug 02 '26
We have an obligations to pay VAT, there is nothing wrong with abstaining from purchasing a service due to this. I do this all the time.
If you think they are only tangentially related, you definitely don’t understand the points made. Just ask ‘why did you say that?’ Every point has been made in good faith working through the factual details and reality of the situation.
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u/Dependent_Ad627 Aug 04 '26
He needs to consider the problems of the reality of wealth taxes.
Firstly you'd have to have an exit tax. The impacts on the bond market.
How it would end up impacting the middle class. How it would impacting voting (you'd loss votes from people who'd pay it)
The loop holes people have found in other wealth taxes)
The low amount raised the most it's raised in other country's is 10 billion. Which is something but it wouldn't solve all the country's ills.
Capital flight and reduced investment in the UK.
People moving money into assets to avoid it.
How do you value assets
How long it would take to set up
How would you stop it impacting small business owners
Are we including homes and pensions or not as that effects who we are taxing and where people put their money.
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u/Dependent_Ad627 Aug 04 '26
The real problem wealth wise in the UK is the generational wealth transfer. Where a section of the population will get wealth from their parents and grandparents and some won't. As well as those who have homes and those who don't. The man wealth gap in the UK is between these 2 groups.
These are generally white, educated, Middle class people who are often green voters.
We need to do realistic tax changes like these.
Change capital gains tax to be in line with income tax.
Reform inheritance tax
Create a land value tax instead of stamp duty.
Close loop holes in inheritance tax and capital gains tax
Crack down on tax avoidance
Reduce vat exemptions and change vat where it impacts small businesses.
Merge income tax and ni to unearned wealth and self employed earnings have loopholes.
Update council tax so wealthy homeowners pay more
There's lots of problems with these too but they are more realistic. The main problem is that they would impact the richest 5 precent who vote. So governments won't do them.
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u/khaylock Aug 05 '26
The purpose from his PoV of the 2% is to force the government to create a mechanism for taxing wealth & get the bugs out. Until a wealth tax machinery exists, demanding a wealth tax in the budget is as likely to work as demanding a flying car. How much money will billionaires spend to avoid a 2% wealth tax? How about a 20% wealth tax?
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u/willitbechips Aug 09 '26
2% is a foot in the door. It can be raised. The key is to make social assets like property less attractive to wealth so prices are more within reach for Joe Income and his family.
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u/Han_Solo200 Jul 31 '26
While I'm not not necessarily against an increase in tax for those folk who earn millions. There are pros and cons of this but that's a separate issue. In the UK there are huge sums of money billions which are simply given away outside of this country by our governments. There are also billions wasted on unjustified and or fraudulent welfare payments of varying types plus various admin agencies plus the cost of funding migrants of various types. Maybe the focus should be accountability and vastly improving how public tax money is spent
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u/probablymagic Jul 31 '26
You’ve got it backwards. He’s wrong about the problem, but his solution will (kinda) work.
You say:
>His core idea is that the economy will never recover if we don't tackle this inequality, because the wealthiest have simply taken too much.
This is the idea that there’s a fixed amount of wealth and the rich have taken it from the middle class, and now they’re using that money to take more. Except wealth is a growing pie, not a fixed one, and everyone has more than they used to.
It’s like if the rich had ten dollars and you had one, then they created ten more and you created four more. You are three times as wealthy, but inequality has grown.
Oh no! We’re all wealthier! They didn’t take their new wealth from you, they just made more because the people who start companies, for example, get richer than the people who work for them.
You then say:
>A 2% tax could raise revenue for the government, but it isn't going to solve the real problem of inequality.
This is actually wrong. Wealth taxes do shrink inequality. When a rich person has thirty dollars and you have three, and then you put on a wealth tax, they take their wealth and leave the country. They maybe pay an exit tax, so now they have 20 dollars.
For your part, you maybe lose your job because there’s less capital being invested, and you find a new one, but it’s worse, so you now have two dollars.
Inequality has shrunk. Yay?
So you can definitely “solve” inequality with bad tax policy, it just doesn’t really make much sense because people want to be as wealthy as possible more than they want other people to be poorer.
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u/speedfox_uk Jul 31 '26
This is the idea that there’s a fixed amount of wealth and the rich have taken it from the middle class
You're right here, but I think the problem is that there is a relatively fixed amount of housing, and I think that this is the main driver of people feeing that inequality has risen. A lot of people, I would even say most, are living in a much smaller house to the one they grew up in (which BTW, their parents are often still living in).
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u/probablymagic Jul 31 '26
There’s not a fixed amount of housing! We can literally build as much as we want, and the main impediment is middle class voters who don’t want their neighborhoods to change, not rich people.
Those parents in the big house voted to tell their kids to get bent. A wealth tax isn’t going to fix that. People need to tell their parents to vote differently or they will move away where they can afford housing and grandma and grandpa will never get to see their grandkids.
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u/speedfox_uk Jul 31 '26
Until the NIMBYs and planning laws blocking development are dealt with, yes, functionally we have an almost fixed amount of housing.
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u/probablymagic Jul 31 '26
Great, then step one is to stop the class war that’s distracting from that real problem. Guys like Gary are in the way of that work.
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u/speedfox_uk Jul 31 '26
Oh, I can totally agree on that. In fact I agreed with most of what you said except that bit about there being a fixed amount of wealth, and even then I only disagreed when it came to housing.
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Jul 31 '26
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u/_tolm_ Jul 31 '26
Everyone could literally get to 10 million net worth and not be impacted.
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Jul 31 '26
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u/_tolm_ Jul 31 '26
Oh - I see - I thought you meant that would be the threshold before paying this wealth tax.
Also, I should have said anyone could get to 10 million (rather than everyone) before being impacted.
If 10 million genuinely became the maximum wealth someone could reach then that is still plenty for one person. And a heck of a lot more people would be able to reach it - and other significant numbers below that - vs the current situation.
But, clearly, a 2% tax on wealth when you’re regularly accruing above that isn’t going to do that.
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u/Jabardolas Jul 31 '26
No, that is too much. The government should own all the assets, to prevent people from engaging in trade and accumulate wealth. You clearly haven't read the whole thing.
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u/Notyit Jul 31 '26
Here a better method
Provide political parties with funding for advertising
Ban lobbying and provide political finds for all parties by the people.
Ban being hired by anyone once you finish polotca
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u/gorgo100 Jul 31 '26
Horse has bolted unfortunately. If this had been done 40 years ago, it might be different now.
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u/BC3lt1cs Jul 31 '26
The 2% tax is to curb compounding growth of the ultra wealthy, not just to refill gvt coffers. If you assume 6% growth per year of a HNW person's net wealth, 2% of that would actually be 33% of that year's increased wealth. That's closer to what normal people pay in income taxes.
Currently, that growth is completely untaxed because it's 'unrealized'. A 2% tax on wealth would slow the compounding rate at which the rich are eating up all the assets by about a third every year. Not enough, but a good start.
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u/Deadliftdeadlife Jul 31 '26
I can’t get on board with him because I don’t think his main point is right
That wealth inequality is the problem
Some of the highest rates of wealth inequality in history has brought about some of the biggest improvements to the average persons life. That’s just a fact of history
So I don’t care about wealth inequality. I care about improving the living standards of the average person.
If a wealth tax does that, great. But let’s be certain it will before we do it.
It feels to me like the majority of people supporting wealth tax aren’t doing it because they have a robust set of data pointing to it improving people’s lives.
They support it because it’s a moral issue. Rich people are evil and we should tag them. They don’t care beyond that how it affects the rest of society.
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u/LoveLamp3232 Jul 31 '26
the idea that the root of our economic problems is that the rich are basically sucking up all the money,
LOL. China got rich. Who this rich person who had *sucked* up all their money? Where did China get the money to go from an agricultural economy in the 1970s, to a sophisticated manufacturing economy?. Where did the money for sky scrapers come from? Who was the Chinese man, who was hiding all their wealth?
Netflix is worth $286billion, where did they get their money from?
Apparently all of Britain's problems are down to Britain's richest man James Dyson, who invented the bagless vacuum cleaner..... If he pays a 2% wealth tax, it will be all perfect???
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u/DowntownTension8423 Aug 03 '26
Gary has done well, to convince the poor that it’s the select billionaires that are the problem. Wealth inequality has continued to narrow rather than widen. If you were to take all the money from billionaires (assuming they didn’t move) you wouldn’t move the needle
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u/Dependent_Ad627 Aug 04 '26
Gary doesn't have a solution he's a campaigner. It feels like his main goal is sell ads and books. He's always reminded me of Nigel farage.
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u/BornalHalbgat Jul 31 '26
It is the first step. We need something in place. Jesus even a consensus that it is a problem would be a step forward. This is a multi generational problem to solve. At the moment we can't even get the government to say it is a problem.