Bill Gates wants ultra-wealthy individuals to pay more tax — and now a growing chorus of billionaires agree.
In his annual “Ask Me Anything” forum on Reddit last year, the Microsoft cofounder said he was “surprised” that taxes for the rich haven’t been increased more.
Gates doubled down on his calls to tax the rich in a panel at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week. He said the wealthiest nations should donate more money to developing countries to help redress inequality.
“Those who have the most — whether it’s countries, companies, or individuals — should be pushed to be more generous,” he said.
It seems others agree, as more than 250 ultra-wealthy people signed an open letter calling for global leaders to impose a wealth tax.
Just so long as it doesn’t reduce their personal wealth, they’re all for ‘paying more taxes’ as long as they can use the loophole of ‘I created a charity in order to avoid paying my fair share of taxes’.
They might realize that increasing wealth inequality might not be good for them either on the long term. They are so rich that losing 99% of their wealth doesn’t have any real impact on their day to day life anyway.
They always say shit like this then put all their money in charities or shell corporations overseas… this is just marketing. He could easily pay more taxes right now if he wanted to.
At this point I think they’re just taunting us.
At this point? These fuckers openly taunt us since the dawn of Assyria lol
Dear Bill,
the german government has a banking account where you can send them money, no questions asked. Feel free to send over your fair share of taxes you are avoiding by routing the Microsoft profits from Germany via Luxembourg and other tax havens.
Ah yes they’ll be starting anytime now, soon… Just wait…
You could start by paying your workers their fair value.
… Microsoft or the Gates Foundation?
I don’t think either are wanting for salaries lol.
So does this mean a wealth tax that will actually hit the rich or simply increasing income taxes that will be avoided by the rich as usual?
Some of these people are so filthy rich they wouldn’t even notice the missing money after their tax bill got paid. I’m pretty well convinced that they are just tax evading for sport.
It’s not for sport, but it’s by the same means anyone with even remotely complex assets gets tax advantages. You pay someone to manage your tax returns for you. You will naturally, by trial and error and recommendations from friends (and in the case of these billionaires, probably have accountants knocking on your door asking to do your returns for hefty fees), end up with the person (or organisation) who saves you the most money, because why wouldn’t you?
Now, you’re still liable for not paying tax you should’ve paid, but I don’t think people are going out of their way to find tax loopholes. Accountants do that for them, and there is absolutely no incentive to find an accountant that’s more “ethical” because, for that industry, it makes no sense to do anything other than get the most back for your clients.
You’re right though. There would be no tangible impact to these people’s lives, and it’s for this reason they should all be supportive of increasing the tax they pay.
Dear Bill,
Would you be up for taxing charities owned by billionaires?
Sincerely yours
Charities are such an obvious money laundering scheme. “Philanthropy” my ass, it’s always tax evasion, all of this is just for the gallery.
Source: https://ips-dc.org/report-true-cost-of-billionaire-philanthropy/?mc_cid=bfa8894a28
Billionaire philanthropy is also frequently a PR thing-- image rehabilitation.
That’s in the “Oh and to sweeten the deal we’ll also throw in these flashy sunglasses for ya, how about that” part of the contract.
It’s about money laundering, everything else is negotiable.
Here’s one of a thousand sources btw, https://ips-dc.org/report-true-cost-of-billionaire-philanthropy/?mc_cid=bfa8894a28
The point of a charity is the wealth is no longer owned by the donor, and it has to be used for one of a few purposes in the public interest. Depending on how the charity is incorporated, I believe some have minimums they must pay out.
Regardless, really?
yes really, instances of abuse of charities by b/millionaires for tax evasion and money laundering are far too common (including transfer of donations back to the donor by indirect ways) https://www.oecd.org/tax/exchange-of-tax-information/42232037.pdf
Where there is a way to abuse something for tax evasion billionaires will find a way
So? You know that Bill can’t really spend all his money so the extra wealth is used to influence policy on national and global scale. Charity is a perfect tool for that and Bill used his to influence American education policy for decades. The “it’s not my money, I don’t control it” is just PR and tax avoidance scheme.
It’s really not that simple, and depends on such a ridiculous amount of variables. If you think these multibillionaires are giving away their money out of the kindness of their hearts you’re deluded.
Where there are many variables, one can always find ways to nudge things in the right ways so that you can get from point A to any other point B despite many other constraints put on your movements.
Ok.
subriemannian geometry
Transliterative or transcendent?
transversal
Take that money and talk and fund progressive politicians so we’ll have systematic change.
This bullshit talk about paying more taxes is worthless.
Oh, thank goodness the billionaires will save us from [checks notes] the billionaires.
Says the guy who funnels his entire wealth through a foundation to avoid paying any taxes. Just like he told Epstein to do. Love you Bill
¯_(ツ)_/¯ At least bill is probably the most generous billionaire that has existed so far
This is what slaves actually believe
It’s all relative. The “most generous so far” can still be a really low bar.
I think Elon is most generous billionaire, for spending 44b to free us from Twitter
Most of his charity is a smoke screen that allows him to hide billions in tax shelters.
If there was ever a generous billionaire, they’d no longer be a billionaire.
It’s really fucking hard to spend that much money in a smart way.
Yea, you could just throw it out of a plane, but when you’ve got multiple billions it’s actually hard. There was even a documentary about it: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088850/
But you see, he deserves it for stealing all that work and ideas from other people
I mean, isn’t that the definition of owning a company? You profit off of the work your employees do
Even when we pretend that’s ok, and pretend that his policy of “embrace, extend, exterminate” is also fine, he personally stole other people’s work. He straight up admited stealing from Xerox (along with Steve Jobs), and stole MS-DOS from Gary Kildall.
It’s extinguish, not exterminate.
Much subtler, see =)
Wikipedia says both are right 🤓
and stole MS-DOS from Gary Kildall
Didn’t he buy it?
Bought it under false pretences and massively profited off of it, but bought it nonetheless. That makes it seem more similar to typical capitalist exploitation than direct theft.
You can voluntarily overpay taxes. Put your money where your mouth is Bill.
Honestly, if you have the option, it’s a pretty simple choice - put it into a charity you know will help people or overpay taxes and watch the money be guzzled by the military.
There are some rich people who recognize that higher taxes are actually good for them in the long-term by increasing growth and decreasing income inequality (which in the long-term, leads to rolling heads). But it’s a Prisoner’s Dilemma style situation - if they, as individuals, donate additional wealth to the government, nothing happens except that their own wealth makes a tiny little drip in the ocean, and their competitors then benefit at no cost to themselves. But if the government imposes a uniform levy on them all, then the cost and the benefits are evenly applied, instead of one ‘suffering’ (and I use the term very loosely) and the others slightly benefiting.
My point here isn’t to lionize them, because ultimately most of them are voicing this opinion out of personal interest, not morality. But it is probably a sincerely held personal interest, rather than pantomime.
I don’t understand this comment. It’s some psuedo-leftist aggression. How can you pay extra taxes? Just not file and get a return? I have filed my own taxes for 20 years and never seen “do you want to pay more?” Other than contributing to the Presidental fund. The only thing I can come up with is not filing after already paying. That’s tax evasion.
You give a contribution to the Treasury Department under their Gifts to Reduce Debt Held by the Public program. In 2022, this amounted to just $180,310.32.
While you can argue that “that isn’t taxes though!”, it is essentially accomplishing the same thing but obviously not taxes because a donation isn’t a ‘tax’. With ~$180,000 from 2022, it is clear this is more bullshit than meaningful intent.
Well it isn’t the same thing and not what my point is, but good to know. I appreciate the comment. However I was asking what the mechanism in paying taxes was to pay more. This is not that.
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We’re way past that point now. Too little, too late.
I’m not very smart but I do sense a catch here. If my ‘suspicion’ (if you can call it that) is right, could someone kindly explain it to me?
The catch is that if they pay taxes and life gets better for other people we agree to not bring out the torches, pitchforks, and guillotines or tar, feathers, and such
The torches, pitchforks, guillotine, tar, and feathers aren’t going to reach a billionaire. They’re going to be used on whoever is around.
You aren’t getting within five miles of a billionaire. They don’t play D&D and eat at McDonald’s, bro. Sorry.
You are more likely to find yourself unfortunately headless than even getting the chance to hurt the feelings of a billionaire let alone their actual person.
If it ever comes to it, rioters are probably going to go after celebrities (possibly including influencers). There seems to be an increasing trend of people being turned off by inauthentic charm and conspicuous consumption, these days. Also, more and more of them seem to have been born into the life (like a child of a celebrity) rather than being elevated from working class life.
Anonymity is the new celebrity.
The torches, pitchforks, guillotine, tar, and feathers aren’t going to reach a billionaire. They’re going to be used on whoever is around.
The point, of course, is that the cost of being a billionaire is that you can’t go out in public- if the public is mad enough about it
Billionaires don’t really go out in public even when the public isn’t mad about it. This is what I’m saying: people think they’re taking something from them that they don’t use and didn’t want in the first place.
“That’s right! The righteous anger of the public now makes you appearing in public dangerous! Try going to MY McDonald’s, Mr. Man!”
It’s just impotent hand waving and revenge fantasizing. Fine and well, I suppose. Oh no, what ever shall they do and all that. 🤣
Financially speaking, a millionaire is far, far, far closer to a homeless drug addict than a billionaire.
No one is stopping you from giving money to the government.
You can make a gift to reduce public debt here: https://www.pay.gov/public/form/start/23779454
You can donate to the U.S. Government here: https://www.pay.gov/public/form/start/708094624
I’m sure what they’re saying is that they want to give the government money but the government won’t let them.
Quit being disingenuous.
Genuinely hard to tell if a joke sometimes
Disingenuous? He has billions of dollars stored in a 501(c)(3).
A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code.
He’s a fucking clown.
They’ll increase the tax and then funnel the government money into their sheets again, but now they can claim that they are being taxed as they should. All’s fair. Except the workers who get shitter pay, worse conditions.
Are they both tax deductible?
I don’t have any idea.
Honestly donating to the national debt probably should be
If you’re gonna tax dodge at least do it in a way that offers even a nominal benefit to the rest of us
This is the same argument the other billionaires, politicians, and the media makes when arguing against Gates, Buffet, and Soros. I’m not saying Gates is a great person, but he’s more or less right in this particular case. It’s kinda like the “so, if you want the homeless to be housed, let them stay in your apartment,” argument.
I don’t disagree with his opinion, I just think he is a tremendous hypocrite.
