Millionaires are calling for a higher taxation of wealthy millions

36 millionaires from Germany and Austria are calling for a higher taxation of wealthy millions. In a letter that is available to the "Süddeutsche Zeitung", it says: "We are wealthy and advocate higher taxation of wealth." The "inequality in Germany and internationally" has been increasing for decades. The poor in particular suffered from the Corona crisis, "while some wealthy people and companies are among the winners of the crisis and have become even richer during the crisis." Specific proposals from the initiative include the reintroduction of the wealth tax, a wealth tax and stricter rules against tax avoidance. The upcoming elections offer "a unique opportunity" to strengthen the orientation of wealth towards the common good, it is said. The appeal was signed by, among others, the IT company founder Ralph Suikat, Antonis Schwarz, heir to Schwarz Pharma AG, and the company heiress Stefanie Bremer (pseudonym). Some of the signatories had already supported a similar international campaign by the aid organization last year. The Disney heiress and filmmaker Abigail Disney and Jerry Greenfield, co-founder of the ice cream brand Ben & Jerry's, participated in this. It was about the fact that wealthy people worldwide should be more involved in the costs of the consequences of the corona pandemic. "Permanently higher taxes for the richest people on this planet, for people like us," are required to finance the reconstruction. The debate about the taxation of large fortunes was recently fueled by revelations from the United States. According to this, the 25 richest Americans paid an average of just 3.4 percent real taxes per year. As the tax expert at the Ifo Institute, Andreas Peichl, told "Spiegel", such cases are also conceivable in Germany. The freedom of wealthy people in structuring taxes is even greater in Germany than in the USA and other industrialized countries. In the USA, for example, the difference between the gross annual income and the income actually taxed at the end is 12 percent, the OECD average is 10, in Germany more than 20, said Peichl. "That means: With us, the rich have a lot more opportunities to pay off poor." According to Peichl, entrepreneurs experienced enormous increases in wealth in the past year. "As long as these assets are invested, for example in shares, they don't pay a cent in taxes on them. Only the actual income is relevant. It's exactly the same in Germany." The researcher does not consider taxing these unrealized capital gains to be a good solution. After all, the legislature would then have to allow unrealized losses to be offset. It makes much more sense to finally close tax loopholes. The global minimum taxation of companies just passed by the G-7 states is also a good measure. If companies were to be taxed at least 15 percent everywhere, it would at least be impossible, according to Peichl, to reduce tax rates to zero. "But 15 percent is still not much, especially much less than the almost 50 percent top tax rate that is provided for high incomes in Germany."