Wealthy Americans like us have rigged the tax code to give ourselves countless handouts, leaving working people paying higher rates than billionaires. We need to build a tax system that puts a check on the extreme inequality that threatens our economy and our democracy.
Today, America’s 800+ billionaires hold more wealth than the 66 million households that make up the bottom half of the country. And yet, because of the way our tax code is structured, they somehow manage to pay lower tax rates than working people.
We started our campaign to urge lawmakers to right this wrong and restore some semblance of fairness to the tax system. There is no reason why investors like many of us should get to pay lower tax rates on the money we make from our wealth than nurses and firefighters do on the money they earn through their blood, sweat, and tears. There is no reason why we should get to pass down large fortunes to our children and grandchildren that have never and will never be taxed. And there is absolutely, positively, no reason whatsoever why billionaires like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos should be able to get away with paying $0 in federal income taxes. (Yes, that actually happened.)
“Tax cuts for the wealthy have never and will never stimulate the economy and create jobs. What they do is make rich trust fund kids like me even richer through utterly unfair means. Most of us are not going out and starting successful businesses, employing workers, or even buying that many goods. We're just sitting on our wealth and letting it accumulate.”
Ian Brownell, Patriotic Millionaire
But the issue with taxes goes beyond just a question about fairness. It’s also about reducing extreme levels of economic inequality, putting a check on the ultra-wealthy’s power, and safeguarding our democracy.
The dirty little secret to having a lot of money is that it comes with power. On account of their wealth, billionaires have the ability to buy mainstream media outlets and entire social media platforms at the drop of a hat. They can spew tons of toxins into the atmosphere with their private jets, superyachts, and spaceships – setting our shared planet on fire in the process – and nobody will stop them. And most importantly, they can bankroll election campaigns, right-wing institutes that provide intellectual backing for policies that help their economic interests, and other political entities to the tune of billions, virtually guaranteeing that their preferred candidates come out on top on Election Day and that a network is already in place for those candidates to do their bidding once in office.
Inequality is a major problem, but the good news is that the solution is simple and staring us all right in the face: taxes. Reforming our tax code to ensure that wealthy people like us finally start paying what we owe is the simplest and single most important thing that lawmakers can do to put a check on democracy-destabilizing inequality. What’s even better is that there are already plenty of specific legislative solutions out there for elected officials to choose from to achieve this aim. In recent years, the Patriotic Millionaires helped to introduce two transformative pieces of tax legislation: the OLIGARCH Act and the American Stability Act.
Let’s be clear: no one, including us, likes Tax Day. But we recognize that we have a patriotic duty to pay taxes along with our fellow citizens, and would be happy and proud to pay more if it means securing the future health and stability of our beloved country.
Tax the rich!
Tax the Rich! How Lies, Loopholes, and Lobbyists Make the Rich Even Richer
In Tax the Rich! former BlackRock executive Morris Pearl, the Chair of the Patriotic Millionaires, and Erica Payne, our Founder and President, take readers on an engaging and enlightening insider’s tour of the nation’s tax code, explaining exactly how the rich — and the politicians they control — manipulate the tax code to ensure they get richer and everyone else is left holding the bag.
At a press conference in August 2024, while standing in front of a table stacked with grocery staples, then-presidential candidate Donald Trump said, “When I win, I will immediately bring prices down, starting on day one.” We’re now officially 100 days into Trump’s second presidency, and not only did the president break that promise, but he is actively pursuing a policy agenda that will make America’s checkout lines wildly more expensive than they already are.
We don’t think it’s too much to ask to have an IRS that is equipped to collect the taxes that Americans owe and to help working people file their returns without undue burden. It’s a pity that the Trump administration disagrees.
The nightmare scenarios anti-tax groups paint ignore the huge impact of ‘buy-hold for decades-sell’ tax avoidance on the taxes our ultra-rich end up paying.
Here at the Patriotic Millionaires, Tax Day serves as a yearly reminder that the ultra-wealthy can bypass many of the frustrating hurdles in our tax code at the expense of working people— and that it’s on us to continually call on lawmakers to raise our taxes. But now more than ever, we need Congress to act urgently, as we are facing an inequality crisis so extreme that it threatens the essence of our democracy.
