Expert panel says report on gap in global wealth between rich and poor highlights need for intervention by G20
More than $70tn (£53tn) of inherited wealth will pass down the generations across the world over the next decade, widening inequality and highlighting the need for intervention by the G20 group of leading nations, a group of economists and campaigners have warned.
In a report ahead of the G20 meetings in Johannesburg, hosted by the South African government later this month, the expert panel said the gap in global wealth between rich and poor will widen over the next decade without a permanent monitoring group such as the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The Nobel prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said the report, commissioned by the South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, found inequality growing in more than eight in 10 of the world’s countries.
How the fuck are these parasites not concerned about more and more Luigi’s popping up???
This one is easy. Inheritance tax at 95%, and then add on top a wealth tax for those with net worth over $5mil of 5% yearly. Boom, Medicare funded, wealth inequality reduced, and humanity lives on.
We are trying 50% above 50 Million in Switzerland right now. It does not have the slightest chance to become law. A huge majority of the population is against it even though it would basically affect no-one.
Glad you’re giving it a go, are there any cogent arguments being made against it or just the usual “I got mine, it’ll trickle down if you’re a good consumer” nonsense?
Hope ya’ll find a way to make it work!
Under a threshold. We were not well off. My parents left me a meager inheritance. It kept me alive. Not fair my parents should be taxed like rich people.
It’s the same story as always- tax the rich more. They will be fine. Us struggling need help and leverage, that’s the whole issue.
Let them have their wealth. I am happy surviving. They have money, I don’t. Isn’t that the point? Capitalism is a cancer, a hydra, it will always devour its host. Where there is disproportionate wealth, there must be ineuqality. But there is more equality between a peasant and another, than between them both and an oligarch.
We need a fucking peasant revolt.
The estate tax currently only applies if your estate is over $13,990,000
I’d be fine with Bernie’s approach - let people try to survive on one dollar less than a billion as a max. Everything over that, tax at 100%.
Reevaluate that cap over time, pinned to COLA/inflation or whatever…
Seems way too arbitrary to set it so high, then have a flat cutoff. I much prefer the idea of starting lower and adjusting the rate up on a curve.
Nah, it’ll trickle down.
Annnnnny day now…
This is where the reverse mortgage is really going to start fucking over the poor.
Oh look, the banks got your inheritance and your family’s real estate.
Living As A Service
I mean it’s just feudalism at this point, with more entertainment.
I am not entertained.
Can it be avoided if the remainder of the estate pays off the home?
Though I guess if that were the case maybe they wouldn’t have gotten a reverse mortgage to begin with…
It will be interesting to see if the people that are seemingly some of the most critical of “boomers” are somehow magically any different than prior generations…once history’s largest wealth transfer in history has transpired.
Knowing human nature, and very critical of the notions commonly bandied about in conversations regarding “generations”, let’s just say I’m very dubious.
Yeah, I doubt it. People talk a big game, but at almost every opportunity they will chose convenience and price despite what they say, and there are few things more convenient than wealth and the ability to use money to make problems go away.
Yup. The boomers were young and idealist and had heads full of ideas of changing the world and human nature, too.
My generation (Gen X) watched things like Ronnie Raygun and the excess of the 80s and yuppies and so on, and watching boomers reveling in excess right after the 60s and 70s and a lot of us sneered and said, “look at these sellouts, doing everything The Man told them to do after supposedly rebelling against The Man, we’ll never be like those guys”. Of course, not all boomers and not all Gen X did these things/had these reactions; just talking verrrrry broad strokes here.
Anyway, the boomers didn’t really seem to course-correct and Gen X, in spite of being called “slackers” and so on, seem to be little different from the trajectory that the boomers went on.
And I bet I could find similar sentiments about The Lost Generation and The Silent Generation and The Greatest Generation if I were to try to mine information from newspapers and books and magazines of the past.
I don’t think Gen Y, Gen Z, Alpha, etc…have any magical property that somehow elevates them as a group, either. I suppose if some truly world-shattering human-altering tech comes on the scene, maybe then. Meaning, something in the transhumanist sphere that somehow is used for good to maximize both intelligence and empathy in all of the human population…something akin to The Matrix, but instead of learning Kung Fu, people gain deep insights and have something that shatters the ego (and lasts beyond just peak experiences from MDMA or LSD or the like).
some truly world-shattering human-altering tech
Maybe say…climate change?
Inheritance taxes are pretty high where I am. I won’t get much of what my parents have earned.
With all the free time in retirement my father has actually tried looking for more optimal ways to structure their wealth. There is none for average normies like us without getting butt fucked by the tax man. This kind of thing no doubt gatekept to millionaires and above. Those who can afford to hire people to do accounting tricks. And to buy politicians to make favorable legislation.
I’m pretty sure a big reason for the massive right wing shift over the past decade is in no small part due to this generational wealth transfer. The rich are fighting economic war that the rest of us don’t even know about.
People are distracted by the current bullshit of politics. Nobody ever talks about this generational wealth transfer. It’s the big one.
In the US they’ve already given what is it like trillions in tax breaks to the rich. The poor are funding it basically.
Everyone thinks things are bad already. I think this is only the beginning.
That is why preovressive tax brackets must be a thing, and those brackets very carefully determined.
This is the very first time I’ve seen the word trillion abbreviated.
I don’t like this trend. When did human civilization become this complacent?
And if capitalists cared about inequality, I’m sure they’d be very worried about this.
They ARE worried. They are worried that the wealth discrepancy isn’t wide enough. They always will, it is the point of capitalism. Make money govern the world, and they who have the most money will govern.
Is that not it? Am I wrong? Is this not exactly what we’re seeing?
Wealth comes from labor.
We could always stop working, you know. All of us at once. Then what?
JFC, inheritance tax much? Get your shit together.
How does this widen the gap? The gap is already there, at worst it’s staying the same through inheritance. It’s more likely to dilute somewhat as there tend to be multiple inheritors splitting up the fortune their parents amassed
I suppose it’s because when the trillions go to the rich, they tend to stay there even after death. And that too supports the trend of trickle up economy. Trickle down is a myth.
Well you see it is the story about Achilles and the turtle. Money compounds. So for every dollar you make, they make what you make plus some multiple, and for each dollar that multiple increases, because they make what you make plus the multiple plus the increase on that multiple that springs from having more dollars than you.
So, not only can you never catch up, the distance between you and them increases exponentially over time, every time you make a dolla.
Sure…but the act of inheritance is not the mechanism that causes the widening of this gap to increase, like the headline suggests. That widening is already happening regardless of the inheritance.
If anything, the potential splitting of the fortune multiple ways very slightly decreases that gap. In addition to the people who didn’t amass that fortune being more likely to spend it faster than it accrues
poor people’s inheritance will be subject to tax, which when paid will be given out to the rich in the form of tax cuts.
rich people’s inheritance will not be subject to tax, as it is wrapped up in trusts, company assets, cash/loan schemes and equity.
At least in the US, No poor people are hitting the cutoff for when taxation even starts. It’s something absurd like 14 million per spouse
