Taxing wealth: flattening inequalities

Significantly and immediately increase wealth taxes to help fund bailouts and economic stimulus packages, and temporarily tax excess profits for all companies that make extraordinary profits. For example, during World War I, Britain and the United States instituted an 80 percent tax rate on profits in excess of an 8 percent annual return.

• Through a coordinated effort, adopt business taxes set at fair and appropriate rates,determined on a case-by-case basis by country, and based on a fair allocation of profits in each country;

• Accelerate the roll-out of automated information sharing mechanisms in developing countries;

• Publish reports on multinational corporations’ activities in every country of operation in order to recover money hidden in tax havens.

Impose taxes on luxury goods and items that threaten the fight against climate change.

Activate a digital sales tax on businesses that rely heavily on digital, an idea popularly known as the “Netflix Tax.”

Although unprecedented financial assistance measures were put in place in recent months, we cannot stop there.

• Maintaining various social relief benefits must be a priority.
• These funds must be allocated directly to individuals, and be based on inclusive eligibility criteria.
• Bailout packages and economic recovery measures must take into account the everyday experiences of the most vulnerable segments– including women, who will be most severely impacted by this crisis.

This should be the case here and elsewhere. Currently, only 20% of the world’s unemployed workers receive financial support. Without assistance, families in the world’s poorest countries have no social safety net. Canada must collaborate with other G20 countries to provide the necessary funding to achieve this objective.

• Supporting small and mid-sized business that create jobs but are poorly equipped to handle this crisis should be a priority.
• Industry should not be given a blank cheque. : Financial support to businesses – whether offered as a bailout package or tax exemptions – must be contingent on their participation in a sustainable, people-centric economy.
• Major corporations whose coffers have been filled by public funds must demonstrate their ability to implement measures to combat climate change, as well as policies that protect the interests of workers, taxpayers, and producers.

To build a fairer, greener economy after the pandemic, businesses must be required to:

• Commit to implementing measures to limit global warming to 1.5°C.
• Cap all dividends paid out to shareholders until these companies pay a living wage to their entire labour force, and invest significantly in the transition to a green economy.
• Disclose the ratio between executive compensation and average employee salary, and set it at a maximum of 20.
• Agree to collective bargaining, hold discussions with independent unions, and ensure female workers can express themselves effectively and confidently.
• Establish quotas on Boards of Directors and executive committees to institute gender parity.
• Close the wage gap between men and women.
• Pay employees a living wage and advocate in favour of decent wages across their entire value chain.
• Publish country-by-country profit reports to dispel any secrecy around the company’s activities in tax havens.

For ordinary citizens living in the world’s most underprivileged countries, the notion of unfettered access to clean water, or the ability to self-isolate at home, is inconceivable. This is where the fight against the coronavirus will likely be most difficult, and the pandemic’s highest death rates will probably occur.

Canada must deploy the necessary human, financial, and material resources required to respond to the UN’s call and eradicate this humanitarian crisis, which threatens the lives of some 40 million people. It must also collaborate with G20 nations to suspend debt service payments by emerging countries and take immediate action to implement preventive activities, administer coronavirus diagnostic tests, and deliver equipment, water, and hygiene and sanitation kits.

This is not simply an act of solidarity with vulnerable populations, but also a self-protection mechanism for all nations. Investing in a worldwide public health system is the most significant driver in the fight against inequalities.