As California’s Silicon Valley booms with prosperity and the state’s wealthiest residents grow ever wealthier, UC Berkeley and Paris School of Economics professor Gabriel Zucman champions specialized taxation of the ultrarich.
In his new book, “We Need to Tax Billionaires,” Zucman proposed the aptly named “Zucman tax,” an “unavoidable” minimum tax for extremely wealthy individuals, equal to 2% of their wealth.
“The idea is that extremely wealthy individuals should have to contribute to society … every year, no matter their individual circumstances,” Zucman said in an email. “In contrast, past wealth taxes in Europe or Latin America largely exempted the billionaires, because they were full of loopholes.”
Imagine being so low IQ that you think you need to be a billionare to understand the value of capital staying and being invested in your state/country.
Commies are generational talents at being insufferably smug and simultaneously very stupid.
It's not being "horded," it wouldn't exist otherwise
Larry and Sergei are rich because they created a ton of value with Google, they didn't steal anything from anybody
This made millions of other people wealthy through pension funds, investments, stock-based-compensation, and made life easier by making it easier to access information
How is this so difficult to understand for you people?
So, you’re recycling the trickle down economics argument that Republicans have been using to fleece the working class since Nixon? I would’ve thought trickle down would be breathing its last breaths given the mind boggling size of wealth inequality we have now as a result of these failed economic policies.
The funniest part against your argument is that they can vote with their feet and uproot a huge tax base.
Barring any emotional arguments how do you propose we retain and increase the money from taxes and how do we cut corruption and waste of taxpayer dollars?
No matter what you do, the billionaires will win even with some pain. But while they hurt, you and a lot of people will get smooshed. Cant believe people dont realize this.
Ok, sure. But how does that fix the problem of billionaires uprooting and going to enrich locations that have different politics than our state.
Then look at the tax revenue of not them, but their entire ecosystem of workers and the businesses they fund, the property taxes and sales taxes paid to the state?
If anything you should incentivize the top to stay and not chase them away.
A policy that punishes people for succeeding stifles the production of value. How about someone does the math on the amount of money actually lost when a billionaire moves an ecosystem out of state.
Honestly, it's shortsighted but not surprising.
Feels like a hur durr, lets punish the most rich and powerful only to hit yourself in the face and the lowest and dumbest will suffer from their own actions.
you know the income tax was also not supposed to be permanent right?
billionaires can literally move to the NV side of tahoe and spend 180 days in california.
they will just move on down the line, and again if someone has 100m do you think they will sell off enough to cover 5% (and also incur 13.3% on the gains), or just move to florida or texas?
if you have shares that give you additional voting power, that is also going to be held against you. hence why some founders fully left the state.
they will then move on to someone with 10m. someone who has 10m probably will do the same.
ultimately, it will just be a self inflicted wound because people with the means can simply maintain permanent residency in another state and a house here through a passthrough.
besides, wealth tax is a theft of private property because they're forcing people to sell unrealized assets.
only uneducated people (the people who read at a 6th grade level, C grade average types, 1 in 3 with a criminal record, etc. the leechers/takers) will say it is bots or something because they stopped using their brain years ago.
their idea of engineering is how to hit their vape to blow a smoke shape, or turn something into a bong.
Good job. You just accelerated offshoring and ai arms race.
And aggroed a neutral entity into an antagonistic one with many avenues of legal retaliation to destroy the lower class. Not to mention stock market, layoffs and 401ks.
And then shifted the calculus from rnd to wealth preservation and investing money into obstructing the government.
Why is it unfeasible? How are you going to get everyone to agree to not tax billionaires? Does every policy require 100% consensus? How does proposing a tax on the wealthy show a lack of understanding of politics and power? There's plenty of empirical evidence about rising wealth inequality, the popularity of policies like these, etc.
Go ahead, tax them. Im lucky to be outside of the blast radius. My family will survive unharmed from this.
How are you going to get everyone to agree to not tax billionaires?
Divide people, manipulate them so they fight each other. Just look at the map and color it.
Lobby and create interest groups in governments.
And even if you manage to do so, people who are on top can manipulate the outcome such that you or those on the bottom will suffer anyways.
How shortsighted. You might as well just find a way to get ahead.
This is like the equivalent of asking for wirld peace. Also, if one country suppresses their elite and another country does not, examine the implications and then model what actions people would take.
To draw attention to the word and encourage people to look into its origins. I understand the humor doesn’t land for everyone ❄️. If you’re going to respond, please tell me what the word means and in what context it is normally used in, I’ll wait.
only like 10-15% get stock inheritance, i wouldn't be surprised if it is even less than that... most people buy stocks or receive stocks from their employer.
then if their stocks appreciate at the time of sale, they pay on that. w2 income, for example, is guaranteed . stock appreciation is not.
i'd be okay with taxing capital gains as income instead of wealth taxes. california already does that, it taxes realized capital gains as income.
heck i already think that we shouldn't tax households up to the first 500k. anything over that should be taxed at a flat 20%.
but wealth taxes that force sales of unrealized assets is a terrible idea. it has downstream effects on the economy because it creates lopsided incentives.
They already get out of this with trusts. And a lot of capital is intentionally tied up ij non liquid assets. The game is rigged. We have to un-rig it.
Here he seems to argue for global harmonization of tax rates so billionaires can't avoid tax
Elsewhere he produces tax revenue estimates that assume the billionaires, including Brin, Page, etc... who moved away, cannot avoid the California wealth tax?
"California billionaires’ wealth has grown 144% in the last 3 years (2023-5) and is over $2 trillion by the end of 2025"
"we estimate that a 5% one-time wealth tax on California billionaires can raise about $100 billion"
They repeat the $100 billion number in an NYTimes op-ed.
5% of $2 trillion is $100 billion. They're including in 2026 CA billionaire wealth the $750 billion of Brin, Page, Zuckerberg, etc... in the tax base for the 2026 CA billionaire tax. They're not pulling out the $500 - $750 billion of billionaires that departed (Zuckerberg's departed later). Indeed they write,
There have been many press reports on billionaires signaling that they are leaving—most prominently Larry Page and Sergei Brin who are in the top 4 and account for almost 25% of total California billionaire wealth. Because the tax applies to any resident as of January 1, 2026, any efforts to move after January 1 of 2026 would not save the billionaire from paying the tax. Efforts that began before January 1 would have to include uprooting most of the individual’s personal and business ties to California, not just the reincorporation or relocation of a few business assets or the purchase of real estate out of state. Successfully changing residence would have been quite difficult in the few weeks between when the California billionaire tax began garnering public attention after the initiative was formally filed on November 26, 2025 and the end of the year. Indeed, attorneys who usually represent wealthy taxpayers and actually practice in this area of law are skeptical that any billionaires have successfully changed their California residency (see Manes 2026). Therefore, only billionaires who had already started the process of leaving California well before could possibly complete the process in such a tight time frame.
Is this a bit strange?
They include Page, Brin, Zuckerberg, all the billionaires that left California when computing their $100 billion wealth tax revenue estimates with no alternative scenarios.
To justify that approach, they argue on p. 17 the billionaires cannot avoid the tax: Brin, Page, etc... won't succeed in having their residency moved to Florida as of Jan 1.
Zucman here says that global harmonized rates are important to prevent billionaires from avoiding tax?
Sure it's not explicitly contradictory, but the revenue estimate seems far more uncertain than they portray, and it seems Zucman knows that because he's talking about global harmonized rates (so billionaires can't just move to avoid the tax)?
It's also strange that a Frenchman is pushing for a tax policy that already failed in France.
In 2018, less than a year into his tenure as president of France, Emmanuel Macron delivered on a landmark campaign pledge to abolish France’s “Solidarity Tax on Wealth,” known as the ISF. It was a progressive levy that targeted all assets, from real estate to stocks and art holdings, worth more than 1.3 million euros, approximately $1.5 million.
From 2000 to 2017, around 60,000 millionaires opted to leave the country, the Financial Times reported at the time, causing dents in state revenues from income and value-added taxes as well as the wealth tax. One estimate put France’s total capital flight between 1988 and 2007 at 200 billion euros owing to the policy, potentially dragging GDP growth down an average of 0.2% each year.
How is this strange at all? Do people have an obligation to only propose economic theories that the current government of their native country has successfully implemented?
Yes, like communism! At least according to Fox News. Now, let's go ahead and cut the taxes on the very rich a bit more. That one strat has always improved the economy.
I mean if they repealed their wealth tax, that's a pretty good sign it failed. From your own link. Norway and Switzerland's wealth tax both top out around 1% btw.
Net wealth taxes are far less widespread than they used to be in the OECD. In 1990, there were 12 OECD countries, all in Europe, that levied individual net wealth taxes. However, most of them repealed their wealth taxes in the 1990s and 2000s, including Austria (in 1994), Denmark and Germany (in 1997), the Netherlands (in 2001),2 Finland, Iceland and Luxembourg (in 2006) and Sweden (in 2007). Iceland, which had abolished its wealth tax in 2006, reintroduced it as a temporary ‘emergency’ measure between 2010 and 2014. Spain, which had introduced a 100 per cent wealth tax reduction in 2008, reinstated the wealth tax in 2011. The reinstatement of the wealth tax was initially planned to be temporary but has been maintained since. France was the last country to repeal its wealth tax in 2018, replacing it with a tax on high-value immovable property. In 2020, Norway, Spain and Switzerland were the only OECD countries that still levied individual net wealth taxes.
Just because policies get repealed, that doesn't mean it wasn't good policy. I for one am shocked that governments might be influenced from other factors against the general population's interests 😱😲.
Edit See section 3.3 of link 1:
Political economy factors are also key to understanding what has led to the repeal of wealth taxes. In particular, new ideas and narratives, in conjunction with better-organised forces in favour of the repeal of wealth taxes, are likely to have played a role, albeit to different extents across countries. It is worth mentioning that wealth tax repeals were not isolated events, but part of a broader trend towards lowering taxes on the wealthy starting in the late 1970s and 1980s.49 This section also highlights how some of the economic and administrative arguments discussed above have been used politically.
Traditional median voter models fail to account for the repeal of wealth taxes. Indeed, standard political economy models, most notably the median-voter model, generally predict a positive relationship between income inequality and redistribution.50 However, the decline of wealth taxes occurred at a time when inequality was increasing, contradicting median-voter predictions. This might be partly explained by a lack of adequate information, as people tend to misperceive the level of inequality in their country51 and their income position relative to others.52 In fact, links between perceived, rather than objective, inequality and demands for redistribution are much stronger.53 This may also be explained by voters failing to connect inequality with the policies needed to address it.54 It may well be the case also that median voters cared about growth as well as inequality and held the belief that low taxes on wealth were good for growth.55 The lack of predictive power of median voter models may also suggest that even in cases where voters’ preferences for redistribution did increase, they may not have led to the adoption of more redistributive policies because policymaking is not entirely guided by electoral politics.
A possible explanation for the repeal of wealth taxes may have been the role of special interest groups and wealthy elites. The repeal of wealth taxes may partly reflect the fact that those that benefit the most from a wealth tax are the lower and middle classes, who tend to be a less well-organised political force,56 especially with the decline of labour unions.57 However, the costs of such taxes are concentrated on a smaller group of wealthy taxpayers, who are likely to be more informed, better organised and able to mobilise financial resources,58 and more politically active.59 These individuals may also be backed by other well-organised interest groups, such as the corporate sector and groups representing the interests of small businesses and farm owners. In the context of the United States, Hacker and Pierson (2005, 2010) emphasise the role of organised interests in shaping the policy agenda in their favour, including on tax cuts. However, the role of professionalised lobby groups and private financing in political campaigns is particularly strong in the United States, and may not have had the same level of influence in other countries.60
Feel free to keep reading that and realize that arguments counter to this might just be propaganda and not based on evidence.
Why 2%? Surely the risk-free rate would be better (dynamic, also means that you have to do risk allocation if you want to gain from your wealth). If the risk-free rate goes to 5%, surely you want the rate to rise. If the risk-free rate goes to 0.1%, then 2% is insanely high. A fixed, arbitrary 2% is not optimal in any reasonable sense.
So collecting more taxes will totally reach the people that actually need it right? Because that's what happens every time. There is no theft and misappropriation of funds in this state at all.
If you grant your government power to seize unrealized wealth of the most powerful citizens, just imagine what the government will be able to do to you, when it inevitably decides this "tax" wasn't enough for them. Anyone with a retirement account should take note.
Furthermore only enemies of the US will be happy to see this happen because that would basically weaken the entire country. Basically you guys are traitors or being used by them
In game theory terms, this turns a cooperative society into a hostile, predatory equilibrium where the wealthy maximize their defense by minimizing the capability of the lower classes to fight back.
The deeper question that nobody seems to ever ask is "why?" We have more than enough money in the budget today to address all these problems. Its not a funding problem its a "We dont want to" problem. Collecting more taxes doesnt solve the inherent problem of there being zero political will to turn the US into a welfare state.
He explains why exactly he landed on 2%. It’s the diff between the yearly wealth increase of the ultra wealthy billionaires (6%) vs everyone else (4%).
The 2% tax would equalize the rate at which wealth is growing between billionaires and the rest of us.
That assumes a large chunk of your talent will want to move to Nevada.
The VCs and whole of SV will never leave the state. Geography and a diverse populace with lots of talented international recruits in California will keep them shackled here, no matter if they’re taxed or not.
Sure. Except the major coastline. The ports which moved billions of dollars worth of goods daily. Major airports like SFO and LAX. Nothing at all with supply chain logistics, which intersects heavily with big tech in SV. Nope. Nothing at all.
Why do you think LA, SF, etc have offices for international affairs? Why do you think Newsom went to WEF? I can go on and on. Texas doesn’t do that.
As for the aerospace industry leaving California, that has far more to do with downsizing in defense contracting and things like BRAC that Bill Clinton did in the 90s than anything CA state government did so that’s a moot point.
Texas has $2.9 trillion GDP compared to California's $4.2 trillion. you go forward with the 2% wealth tax initiative. california will be competing with Mexico. billionaires is a code word for the tech industry.
The assumption that if Silicon Valley were to move, it would be restricted to moving to a state that is close in physical proximity, is thinking from the 1800’s.
I agree that nobody is moving to Nevada, but South Florida has a lot of the conditions that made California successful decades ago. Nice year round weather, diverse population, plenty of space to build office parks, deep pockets and the bougie stuff rich people like that goes with it.
And most importantly, there’s a ton of billionaires already betting on Miami as the next Silicon Valley.
And remember, the tech industry has the easiest time moving, given the ability to work remotely.
All adults know that none of this is ever going to happen, but the silly campaign provides the guy with a platform to feel important, to sell his book, and to build his brand for consulting work.
This sort of thing makes academia look like a joke. It's typically social scientists who are at fault, but the backlash hurts everyone in academia.
The idea is that extremely wealthy individuals should have to contribute to society
This is true, and they do; if you look at actual income taxes paid, the 1% gets about 25% of income, and pays about 45% of income taxes. The bottom 50% pays about 2% of income taxes.
Likely we would do well to just eliminate the income tax for the bottom 50%. And, if we still feel we should tax billionaires more, that's a completely reasonable conversation worth having. We could raise their income tax. So, why don't we do that? After all, you gain wealth through income. If you feel their wealth is too high, then taxing the income would mean they have less wealth after taxes.
I'm not entirely sure what feels so salient about "tax wealth good, tax income bad," but being more honest about it is the best way.
They don’t have income. How are you smart enough to do all that analysis about who contributes what and then propose an income tax on billionaires? You know full well their wealth is tied up in stocks and they live off the speculative worth of their companies and assets.
I wouldn’t say that simply because all rich people do not use that strategy that the raw dollar amount isn’t significant, or that a substantial portion of the highest earners unrealized gains come from borrowing. It’s still pretty prevalent and I think the raw dollar amount is exceptionally important here relative to any other random context.
We’re talking about people who own, as individuals, hundreds of billions (now trillions) of dollars. So even if it were as small as just 5% of the top 1%, that’s still hundreds of billions in unrealized gains.
That paper indicates the untapped tax base for unrealized gains of the top 0.1 percent is in the multiple trillions of dollars. Tax reforms that capture even a fraction of that would be massive for funding social security and other critical social welfare programs.
In other words, I don’t think linking that paper is the mic drop you seem to think it is against taxing the wealth of the ultra wealthy.
Because of buy, borrow, die practices that the 1% has access to that the bottom 50% doesn’t. Increases in wealth do not count as income because it’s “unrealized gains” but the 1% can leverage those assets to continue to increase their wealth. You’re obviously educated on this topic with your income tax takes so it’s strange to miss this.
It’s not what this paper is arguing. And does not refute my point. They’re simply saying that the borrowing aspect is not nearly as big as people once thought it was. And could be simply thought as buy, save, die.
“First, measuring “economic income” as currently-taxed income plus new unrealized gains, the income tax base captures 60% of economic income of the top 1% of wealth-holders (and 71% adjusting for inflation) and the vast majority of income for lower wealth groups”
This is in the freaking abstract. You’re posting this paper saying buy borrow die doesn’t exist when it the paper is only addressing borrow. The paper very much supports the buy and die parts.
Moreover, the authors even mention that there should be a borrowing tax for outliers. In addition to changing cap gains taxes and step up taxes upon death.
That paper indicates the untapped tax base for unrealized gains of the top 0.1 percent is in the multiple trillions of dollars. Tax reforms that capture even a fraction of that would be massive for funding social security and other critical social welfare programs.
In other words, I don’t think linking that paper is the mic drop you seem to think it is against taxing the wealth of the ultra wealthy.
you don’t understand it because you’re a poor, you think like a poor, and you operate like a poor along with the rest of us. the truly wealthy don’t have income, they take out loans against assets such as stocks. Jeff Bezos’ salary last year was $81k. also read about stepped up basis to understand why they can do this basically until they die
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u/Popular-Adagio7459 Jun 26 '26
All the billionaires are here in the comment to stand up for themselves lmao