Are our millionaires taxed enough?
Tax the rich! This is a slogan heard often in political discourse. However, there is much debate about whether increasing taxation on society's wealthiest is firstly, fair, and secondly, conducive to reducing economic inequality.
Moderated by IEA Head of Political Economy, Kristian Niemietz, Mark Littlewood, IEA Director General, debates the subject with Gary Stevenson of Patriotic Millionaires.
Gary Stevenson is an economist and former interest rate trader in London and Tokyo. In 2011 he became Citibank’s most profitable trader globally by correctly predicting that the aftereffects of the 2008 crisis would lead to a long term stagnation in interest rates and a rapid rise in asset values. In 2014 he retired, at 27, to study economics and inequality at Oxford University. He is currently working on economic models of inequality, wages and asset prices.
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#Taxation #Economics #IEA
IEA getting schooled for an hour straight by hero millionaire trader on inequality crisis... epic
It’s so good ❤
It never works to tax the rich. What does work is to remove their power to influence society with their money. 1) Ban foreigners owning UK property. Give them one year to sell and then confiscate the property and put it for sale on the free market. 2) Ban people from owning more than one property by taxing second property at 10% per year so they will sell or lose it over 7 years. 3) Ban people from leaving property empty for more than 3 years, just tax it at 10% per year. 4) Build 5 million new homes. Build a few more brand new cities on land where cows or crops are currently wasting the use of the land. Build some beautiful new sea side resorts. 5) 1% mortgages for first time home buyers. 6) Mortage payments at no more than 25% of ones personal income. This would massively improve the quality of life of people. 7) Imprison or strip the wealth of useless politicians who do not improve the quality of life of the citizens. Currently all politicians are absolutely useless and damaging their nations.
What about creating a tax system where to tax the superrich to the maximum, but to give the tax free option for the money that will be invested in the economy?! That will stimulate the super rich to invest rather that hoarding wealth and inflating assets prices.
@@zrymill 1) When buying property, foreigners invest a large amount of needed capital into the country 2) But then where would the renters live? 3) Empty property is already taxed through full council tax enforcement 4) I agree about building new homes but why are cows and crops a waste of land as you put it? 5) 1% mortgages would be good if prices always go up! What happens when they go down and owners become stuck in negative equity? 6) I totally agree about mortgage payments 🙂 7) I absolutely totally agree about many politicians intentions. The entire corrupt system requires reform and a move away from corporatism.
1) Allowing foreigners to buy property in the UK, it just creates a shortage for the people who live there and deprives them of being able to purchase that property, which in turn forces them to rent or pay higher prices. Also we don’t need foreign capital, it just causes inflation because there’s more money chasing less goods. 2) Government should by law be forced to make sure there is adequate supply of homes to rent and/or buy. There need to be sever penalties for the political class who fail to do this, its gone on forever so far, and its time for a change. We need to basically put the rental property investor out of business by making sure there is no need for their services. 3) Taxing empty houses isn’t enough, we want them used by people who need to buy them to live in them. 4) When we need millions of new homes we need to be able to build anywhere if necessary, which would include on land currently used for cows, sheep and crops in some cases. 5) Negative equity wouldn’t really matter if mortgage payments were about 25% of income and so long as governments keep printing more and more money causing inflation, its guaranteed house prices will keep going up with inflation. @johntbaxter @zrymill 1) When buying property, foreigners invest a large amount of needed capital into the country 2) But then where would the renters live? 3) Empty property is already taxed through full council tax enforcement 4) I agree about building new homes but why are cows and crops a waste of land as you put it? 5) 1% mortgages would be good if prices always go up! What happens when they go down and owners become stuck in negative equity? 6) I totally agree about mortgage payments 7) I absolutely totally agree about many politicians intentions. The entire corrupt system requires reform and a move away from corporatism. @zrymill It never works to tax the rich. What does work is to remove their power to influence society with their money. 1) Ban foreigners owning UK property. Give them one year to sell and then confiscate the property and put it for sale on the free market. 2) Ban people from owning more than one property by taxing second property at 10% per year so they will sell or lose it over 7 years. 3) Ban people from leaving property empty for more than 3 years, just tax it at 10% per year. 4) Build 5 million new homes. Build a few more brand new cities on land where cows or crops are currently wasting the use of the land. Build some beautiful new sea side resorts. 5) 1% mortgages for first time home buyers. 6) Mortage payments at no more than 25% of ones personal income. This would massively improve the quality of life of people. 7) Imprison or strip the wealth of useless politicians who do not improve the quality of life of the citizens. Currently all politicians are absolutely useless and damaging their nations. @@johntbaxter
Thumbs up for Gary. No thumbs for Mark.
apart from the thumb he's got stuck up his own arse.
Did we watch the same debate? Pie in the sky wealth tax nonsense backed up by interruption and bad faith argument gets a thumbs down from me.
Agreed. Mark just rambled on the same points of low tax and small state, over and over and over again.
@@samuel5742 cant be that bad faith considering the chancellor has suggested tax rises and a higher burden on the wealthy, on the Sophie Ridge Show this morning. All Gary’s points.
@@darthmonkey74 Forgive me Mr Healey but just because the chancellor paid lip service to this fellow's ideas does not mean that his method of discourse was not substandard.
Credit to IEA for hosting this debate. It is brave (and genuinely worthy) to pitch yourself against someone who is clearly more knowledgeable and insightful than you are and to try to marshall your arguments (mostly unsuccessfully) against them. More of these sorts of honest, detailed discussions please.
Let's be clear the only thing the iea can do to deserve credit is admit they have been a shameless force in corrupting governance to promote the interests of a small number of asset rich sociopathic vandals, then disband themselves and apologise....
He won't be invited back!
Yes Gary is a heavyweight - you cant argue with the basic fact of 'i got paid big because i was right all the time' This was still an intelligent productive discussion, big respect to the hosts and for iea for having him on. More!
I don't think Gary is in any way more insightful than mark, stevenson has one trick, shout about wealth taxes yet never explains what has happened to countries that try them.
@@davidtelford2250which countries have tried them?
I’m staggered by the extent to which Mark really hasn’t thought about this stuff, and still in some way, thinks this is an ideological argument. Really does expose the thinking in these think tanks. They are as tired as this current government. There really is only one answer left, and it is the one Gary is advocating.
Nicely put
The IEA and Gary agree on almost everything.
Eh? Gary's position is ideological too - "wealth should be taxed, just as income is". You and I might find that ideology more appealing than the IEA's ideology of shrinking that state to the size of a peanut, but let's at least be honest that it is still an ideology nonetheless.
@@tomgl6684 I suppose my point was, we are slightly beyond an ideological argument when people have amassed the amount of wealth we see at the top of society. It becomes more practical, in the sense that, it's about saving society from total collapse. But I do take your point, very hard to escape ideology when talking about distribution of wealth (or the lack of it). I think it is also worth saying, Gary makes his money on the money markets, and does describe himself as a capitalist (as far as I know)
Is being a good person ideological?
What’s chilling is Gary’s comments about 1/2 of the UKs population is going to have problems paying for their utilities/gas bills to stay warm. 9 months since this video and here we are…. Still getting poorer.
What is chilling is the fact financial education is not part of the curriculum in our state schools. The majority have no clue how to invest for the future, what is an asset and what is a liability. Sad really.
@ineer A "stupid decision" and an addiction based on years of having fulfilled that addiction, being marketed to by the purveyors of that addiction, and having lived in a culture where that addiction was exemplified as normal is probably a contributing factor though. Imagine if it were legal to advertise crack, get a bunch of poor people addicted to it, and then some idiot turned around and said "yeah well poor people obviously just make bad decisions totally of their own volition" - I'm not saying you're saying this, I think your viewpoint is reasonable and I'm obviously exaggerating, but you get my point: there's a reason as to why those decisions are made and people aren't always able to simply make decisions based on "free will". Also what Ryan was saying is not necessarily that people need direct economic opportunity, opportunity comes in many forms and can be invested in through public spending rather than giving directly to any one individual do with it what they wish - i.e. higher education, health and social care, social housing, third spaces, etc.
Good job! I become richer. So whose fault is it?
If we pursue intermittent energy sources like wind and solar and discourage or even punish investment in gas, that will happen. This is a green policy outcome.
And as Gary said, we're the sixth richest country in the world.
Gary is basically Cassandra, the power to predict the future but nobody wants to believe what he's saying because it's so dire.
It isn't because it's dire, the rich don't want to believe him because it's against the interests of the rich. Commentators don't want to believe him because they are paid to believe the opposite.
Great way to put it and you just taught me about an interesting figure in Greek mythology so thanks for that!
Nobody "in positions of power want to believe", lots of us agree with what Gary says about massive inequality and its consequences. Good on him
That infuriates me it seems s easy to predict the future if you understand inevitability look at NWO so called conspiracy theorists or the bible or history books or agent understanding f human nature every single one of these PREDICTED THE FUTURE ITS INEVITABLE the NWO and digital prison and track trace hate crime thought crime would happen because as soon as tech allows it the elites will do it photo id computer id digital finance as soon as a king a lord a Goverment can do something THEY DO IT there’s sold everything and everyone out there was always going to be a END GAME HERE.. agenda 2030 is the code word for NWO and the illiminarti plot plan if global order and everyone under north them getting screwed over. Here’s a fine example of predicting the future I invested in Nintendo in 2005 before DS and Wii gaming systems IT WAS INEVITABLE THAT WII AND DS WOULD DISRUPT THE CURRUPT OUT IF TOUCH GAMING INDUSTRY it was also inevitable that Sony and ms would never earn back the billions wasted on ps3 and x360 I told everyone this online was called weird mentally ill a fanboy a idiot I made 50k turn into 250k with my Nintendo investments Sean malstrom the biggest voice online made a million Wii DS went in to sell huge numbers fast and profit by billions ps3 lost 8 billion x360 lost 6/7 billion it was also inevitable Argentina would win the treble. Copa euro South America cups and then the World Cup it was obvious for three reasons Messi still had it marafona had died and the team manager had rid the narcassisim and romance of the past they destroyed everyone else as Argentina should do it was coming it was in the air to anyone who understands football history I made 100k on that bet. It was inevitable the resent float of ARM CPUS SRM HOLDINGS WOULD go to the moon Whitch it did it was obvious endless money printing and zero interest rates would lead to inflation super inflated prices and gold increase gold didn’t go up because of billionaires it’s went up because of money printing and inflation it was inevitable that child support and endless welfare would destroy the family unit. And female nature was weaponised by the elites to do so .. I could go on all day doing maths dat in your head or knowing the names of every celebrity or every yr in history’s kings name is considered intelligence Noooo wisdom is intelligence Covid was a scam digital id digital currency and new laws hate crime thought crime and new vaccines are and always were warned weapons of inevitability of the NWO people need to fking wake up..
He's wrong though. Things aren't getting worse because inequality is increasing, inequality is increasing because things are getting worse. Because our government prevents market function, the planning system prevents building and investment, the tax system prevents investment, we import millions of immigrants to keep the cost of labour down at the cost of capital investment etc etc. Notice Gary doesn't actually give any real solutions to the structural problems.
23:00 You know we're all fucked when Gary has to explain to two wide-eyed adults with educations the taxation problem where billionaires pay less than the working class. The other guest probably spends more time on that hair than thinking about the single largest source of modern wealth inequality. Why? He has been trained by a system to know the bounds of the debate. Oddly, the billionaires own that system. Weird. Thankfully, Gary is here to bring the reality.
He doesn't have to explain it - they would just prefer it wasn't brought up when they start talking about Laffer Curves.
@@tomgl6684 Fair enough, but I'm not suggesting they don't understand -- just that they're so accustomed to ignoring those ideas in typical discussions that when Gary launches in, they can't hide their unease in having to face the facts
The iea are very much part of the problem.
I really liked how even though the presenter asked Gary to say something nice about capitalism to close on, he just stuck to his guns and concluded with another dire warning.
Yes the presenter didn't ask Mark to say something nice about the other point of view
That Mark Littlewood is very skilful at talking non-stop for ever and ever without actually saying absolutely anything at all whatsoever.
It is a skill unto itself. It can make you a lot of money.
@@jf2176 A bit like stealing can eh - except that there's a law against that.
And with a loud and authoritative tone that is impenetrable. A debating technique that is learned rather than coincidental I discovered some years ago.
I'd just like to congratulate the IEA, and similarly aligned think tanks, on their recent success with the mini-budget. It's been almost as successful as when your man Art Laffer took control of Kansas's fiscal policy.
Yeah, I wonder where else I've heard Liz Truss' soundbite about growing the pie so often over the last couple years?
And that went really well didn’t it?😂
LOL
😂
Are you being sarcastic?
Only one of these people actually sound like a credible economist, the other sounds like he’s being paid to defend the indefensible with regurgitated prepared lines.
Sadly, sounding credible and being an economist are mutually exclusive. The old adage "those who can, do, those who can't, teach" is pretty damning of teachers, but it's accurate about economists. If you really know what you're talking about, someone is probably paying you to keep what you know to yourself.
@@johnbehan1526So you're saying that Gary doesn't know what he's talking about despite the fact that he has accumulated millions of pounds betting on the markets and predicting economic trends.
@@Matt-ou7tuentirely the opposite. You've either got the wrong end of the stick about what I've written, or there's some attempt at ironic humour here that has sailed over my head
So frustrating that it’s guys like the IEA running the country (into the ground), who just don’t have the imagination to grasp the scale of the problem. They’re just not getting it. Gary gets it 100%, because he can clearly see both sides.
IEA is running the country, but they're criticizing the low interest rate policy of the government?
They dont run the country at all . Politicians do , yes and we vote them in every time
What about creating a tax system where to tax the superrich to the maximum, but to give the tax free option for the money that will be invested in the economy?! That will stimulate the super rich to invest rather that hoarding wealth and inflating assets prices.
I would imagine they are not getting it because they are funded by the 1%
@@silviupadure2555I don’t think that would work because there investment is just another form of asset which means more money to the rich. Wealth tax and wealth caps are the only way to solve this issue.
Wot I heard, my takeaway; Gary, "Tax the assets of the rich." iea, "The rich are mobile, waffle on for ages about irrelevant BS, blame Lewis Hamilton." Gary, "You can't move assets, look at Abramovich, he couldn't move Chelsea FC, tax the assets, they can't be moved, tax at source for usage/rent. Hamilton don't count he earns his money from working, he's not the problem, The Duke of Westminster got £9 billion tax free" iea, "gov is too big, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, etc " Gary, "There's going to be an economic catastrophe, (it's like the Monopoly board game), the (idle) rich will buy ALL the assets (houses and businesses, rentier style) cos they've got too much money and there's no growth to invest in. The reason there's no growth is cos there's no investment cos the productive people (ordinary workers like Gary's dad) have no money left after paying rent and bills.
Not rocket science is it. Makes you wonder why they refuse to see it.
Thank you for laying yourself bare, iea. I assume it was hubris and a total lack of self awareness that led you to publish this, but thank you all the same. Your arguments were circular, nonsensical and a great example of motivated reasoning, very instructional. The system is fundamentally unbalanced and that imbalance will continue to accelerate without government intervention to correct. This will in all liklihood not happen.
The government was intervening through the artificially low interest rates. That's part of the problem. And yes when the government tries to manipulate prices or interest rates, that will naturally create imbalances.
@@andrewgeissinger5242 you're totally wrong but its funny how we both diagnose the same problem but have totally different ways of solving it.
The government is not only complicit in this but directly involved. Asking them to fix the problem would be like asking a lion to stop eating wildebeest. We need to destroy the current systems of democratic republics and install a system of party moderated direct democracy with highly vetted auditing for the financial affairs of parliamentary officials.
Gary is on the ball, we DID have a good stable life for all people in the 60s and 70s and we need to re-nationalise the energy companies.
Absolutely and water and the rolling stock rail companies which do nothing apparently.
And BT and the Royal Mail and please let’s get the NHS and its staff paid and funded correctly!
Why is the old man heavy breathing over Gary?!
Last I heard, he's quite a heavy smoker...
Likes young guys.
Gary is spot on that this will eventually lead to Govt going bankrupt. Ordinary people are now probably not even paid enough. To pay the amount of tax to cover the cost of state provisions. Education, health care, transport infrastructure. If these were privatised and paid for directly by the consumer. Most people would not earn enough to afford them. At least that way the private providers would go bust if they did not or could not adjust prices. In the current system a lot of those private entities get subsidised by government borrowing. We don't live in a free market and never will, it can't see how it could exist. All we ended up with is cronyism.
Get rid of more regulations?! As if Grenfell wasn't bad enough?! And he thinks fracking is a good idea?! So it's profit at any cost then, clearly. 🤦♀ I watched this because I think Gary Stevenson is brilliant, but it was fascinating and horrifying to see the world through the eyes of someone who thinks Hong Kong and Singapore is the way forward. Thanks for being the voice of intelligence, sanity and compassion, Gary.
The reality is actually more horrifying than you suggest. The people propagating these 'bad faith' tropes are well aware of the flaws in their arguments, but nonetheless use them to maintain a degree of public uncertainty and give ammunition to those who already wanted to align themselves in this direction. Until we expose these people for the charlatan's they are, progress will be difficult.
@@craigrees7939 I agree. It's a form of manufactured consent to maintain the status quo for a deeply embedded entitled establishment.
Economic terrorists
I find it extremely ignorant to think of Singapore and Hong kong as similar let alone the same. Hong kong is a hell hole for people not in the 10% of the pop. You have elderly living in makeshift homes built out of sheaths of metal and young people not being able to afford the tiniest apartments even with good salaries. Singapore on the other hand, IS a good place to live. They have one of the highest home ownership rates, and the majority of housing is PUBLIC housing. Also, land and property aren't owned indefinitely. After 99 years, it gets returned back to the government. This prevents land accumulation and gaining wealth by just owning property and sitting on your ass waiting for the property prices to rise so u can sell yours. It also leads to better use of land since it's a liability to just own and not do anything with it for long periods of time. This is just one example. The healthcare system is also a great example of very pragmatic policies combining both competitive markets and good government regulations to provide the best service, for the majority of people, for as cheap as possible. The UK would be much better off if it learned a thing of two from Singapore, but the political system/situation would never allow that unfortunately.
Mark Littlewood and IEA are free market fundamentalists and when their warped ideas make contact with reality Kwasi Kwarteng's budget happens... it's all dogma, bluster and has no actual basis in reality, which is why Gary was able to disprove most of it here with absolute ease...
hahaha the IEA just had someone say they would be ok with a land tax. Fucking hell, well done Gary.
A very interesting and somewhat balanced debate but I feel Mark lost at around the 14:40 mark where he suggested he would buy a second home if he had more money. It absolutely proved Gary's point throughout the debate.
It's incredible how economists can have such a fundamental lack of understanding about how money works.
The longer this went on it just turned into the guy on the left repeating libertarian bromides over and over again (I think the attempt to scrap housebuilding regs and have us all live in rabbit hutches was repeated 3 or 4 times) and not letting the guest speak at any length. Some interesting stuff but the Gary’s Economics channel and his other interviews have been more enlightening imo.
@Guttural Tuttle lol fragile
Is it me but people from the iea hate Keynesian economics and they hate deficits. Why do they then espouse neo-liberal economics. The govt ran mostly surpluses from 1946 until 1980. This was primarily under the post war settlement keynesian economics. The whole time since 1980 beginning with Thatcherism, has been running deficits. Also the trade deficit, national debt, and inequality have gotten much worse. We surely need to find a new system, or go back to the previous system. We are clearly heading towards societal collapse and/or feudalism the more we allow inequality to grow.
@Guttural Tuttle You calling me ignorant and a loser? For caring about inequality, which is something that ultimately at a certain point leads to societal collapse. Surely only an ignorant loser would, throw about childish statements like that!
The have a newer, better, improved version called Fewdalism. Specifically designed to benefit the few...
@@marcconaghan1522 you sound daft Thatcher paid lip service to capitalism no serious capitalist would subsidizes industries
Exactly. Mark wants to reduce the debt, but doesn''t seem to realise this means reducing the amount of bonds in existence, which can only happen by taxing the bondholders i.e the rich. He hasn't joined the dots at all.
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Littlewood claims he is concerned about crony capitalism and also the poor and average person. Well, if you judge those claims by the IEA's output, that's simply not the case.
He is being out classed by Gary, Littlewood is not for the poor or struggling, he likes it just the way it is.
Exactly
Why did he say he was in favour of a land tax then? If I recall he was the only one who proposed actual policies? Please reference IEA output that made you come to this conclusion.
@@nialltube2245 It's insane how people can listen and watch this and think Gary came out as the victor here. Mark was clearly the reasonable person and has good ideas. Implementing them isn't easy. He isn't the prime minister.
@@AtlasofInfo Absolutely insane.. Who'd believe a guy that was right 13 years in a row, right, Atlasofinfo?
Singapore has a highly regulated property sector. The government owns most of the housing!
Never let facts get in the way of a good story.
And an enormous number of low wage temporary migrant workers . About a third of Singapore’s three-million-strong labour force is non-resident with almost 90% of this comprising of low-wage temporary migrant workers holding work permits or S-passes.[1] These workers are concentrated in industrial sectors such as construction, shipbuilding and repair, and conservancy and household work where they make up almost the entire labour force.
So? The problem is building rate compared to population growth, Singapore builds more per capita. France builds 4x more housing per capita than the UK
Exactly.
Gary always talks good sense.
The IEA guy says at the beginning that he has benefited by the property price boom to the tune of several hundreds of thousands of pounds and later describes himself as 'modestly middle class' ... that's your inequality right there - these people just have no grip on reality
Yeah it’s all relative, so his best mate probably made £1m so like all Tory scum he thinks he’s hard done by.
It's like you've not listened to anything Stevenson has said: whilst Littlewood (and multi-millionaire Stevenson himself, to an even greater extent) have unarguably done well, both of their interests are more similar to that of the part-time minimum wage retail worker than the those of the Duke of Westminster.
A fine example of two people disagreeing with each other in a polite and positive way without trying to get each other cancelled or crying and screaming and storming out the room. 👍
Possibly because neither has one eye on career advancement.
Sound control is very important when you're making a video. While the guest is talking it sounds like he's talking over a dirty phone call from Darth Vader
What's annoying is that Gary allowed that guy to make many points, but when Gary tries to address each of those points, the guy always jumps in. Let Gary respond to each of your points. And why doesn't the guy in the middle arbitrate better!?
The IEA guy said nothing in reality. (His job is to redirect the narrative & provide cover for his rich backers)
He is a slipery, devious kleptocratic fraudster advising the kleptocratic oligarchy!
I think that's true on both accounts. He said nothing that isn't economics orthodoxy. And yes, he is paid to advance free market ideas, and most of that money comes from the wealthier people.
@splen borg The disturbing thing to me is that I can see from ( red tie ) his body language that he 100% knows that what Gary is saying is correct. It is as if his job is to muddy to the water and make sure to distract from the fact that wealth inequality is the root issue that needs addressing.
@@farhiyadirir8497 they all know what Gary is saying is right. Their job is to obfuscate and make sure such concepts are never implemented as this would adversely impact on their billionaire funders.
I wanted to understand the other side of the coin but had a very hard time after suggesting that "enterprise spirit" would save the UK. Taxing the rich sounds hard. But i suspect not as hard if we do nothing. Its not the poor agaisnt the rich its the poor and the rich agaisnt chaos.
It seems like the guy on the left doesnt even understand what the guy on the right is saying. He just keeps on uttering things that he's probably been saying his entire career but he is not really responding in a meaningfull way at all
I am staggered that this conversation went on at 2 levels, Gary taking a much bigger picture view and Mark taking a narrow view representing the interests of his undisclosed funders.
Gary should be come a politician, get his hands on the tax pot and deal with it correctly.
they would never allow someone like Gary to be a politician he's too honest and has no interest in pandering to parliament
Oh, how I'd love to see him as the shadow chancellor, taking that fraudster Sunak apart in the commons!
He would fail, and you would say you'd never supported him.
Gary didn't go to Oxford so tough luck joining the rich kid's club sorry parliament.
@@googane7755 He literally did go to Oxford, you utter berk and he is, by his own admission, really quite rich. Nice job showing off that chip on your shoulder.
It's not in a property billionaires interests to build homes to increase supply. And match demand to lower prices, in turn lowering the returns on the property the billionaire owns!
we don;t need more homes just less people
@@garethwilliams4467 🙄
@@lynnevenables7193 Let me guess, immigration is ok, as long as it doesn't live near you?
@@garethwilliams4467 why do immigrants scare you so much, they don’t scare me, the government does though.
@@lynnevenables7193 well .. .they swamp public services, education and cheaper housing. All while not bein a net contributor when their benefits are taken into account. Also, they swell the population of this green and pleasant land ... reducing my quality of life with traffic, pollution, parking, building etc .... why would I want any of that
The problem with the IEA arguments is that they see society as a mass of individual economic agents and have little time for any kind of public goods. To make society work we need to spend lots of money on common things such as roads and other transport infrastructure, schools, health, public administration, police, the justice system, parks etc., which is why we pay taxes. All of these things make society a pleasant place to live. The IEA view seems to be that all these things should be available privately, hence the framing of tax as part of household expenditure/consumption. It's a sleight of hand to talk about tax in this way: we pay it in order to have a functioning society. Likewise with regulation - it sounds like these are all a pain to comply with but ultimately regulations protect our health and safety, protect the environment, stop us being exposed to injury or death when we're working etc.
but whose money are you going to spend. And don't say everyone pays a fiar share, becasue the poor never do. You just take it from those that have it, they end up paying for those that can't pay their way, Then when those that have paid the most like the NHS .. they can't. Becasue its full of obese alcoholics or drug addicts that don't pay
Hi@@garethwilliams4467 - thanks for the reply. Yes, the people with the most money have benefited most from society so it's reasonable for them to pay more back. Lots of wealthy people ask the state to tax them more because they see the benefit of it. Some people do take more out of the system than they put in, but it's not a good situation to be in and I don't think most people would choose to be poor and reliant on the state. The principle of the NHS being free for all regardless is about human dignity and the right to health care - this is something of great value and I'm happy to pay taxes to uphold the principle. Societies that don't have universal health care are much less pleasant places to live.
@@alextilley8323 wrong 1) The people with most money have given society the most - ie creating jobs etc, and if you look at highe earners such as footballers they take very littel but pay a massive amount of tax, they are where they are due to an incredible work ethic and ability. 90% of people in this country have a similar education and background. 2) Only the virtue signallers asked to be taxed - and don't mean it. There is nothing to stop a wealthy person who wants to give their money away starting a charity or walking down the street handing out money - if they mean it. 3) Lots of people who take out more that they put in LOVE doing so, due to laziness and mental make up, being reliant on the state is great - becasue we live in a world without individual responsibility and the state can make you rich in the UK eg, satellite TV, guaranteeed housing, nerw boiler, mobile phones go to the benefit class in this country. 4) You have no right to helath care - why should you ? If you can't provide it for yourself and without good reason, to take it from me is morally bereft. Why should I pay for your hospital treatment if you're not a net contributor to the UK. 5) It's only your perspective that the UK is great place to live becasue of it's largesse. I much preferef the USA - very little sense of entitlement, people payed their way and took responsibility. Much better for the health of a society. I'm betting you taker out of the system more than you put in.
Hi @@garethwilliams4467 sounds like we'll have to agree to disagree about this. Have a good day.
@@garethwilliams4467 you’re actually wrong on who creates jobs, it’s demand that does that, where there’s no demand, there’s no job, no tax. What happens then? I think tax wealth, invest in the country, create jobs, tax and the country ticks over!
Gary great points. Let’s get the rich taxed and sort this disaster out.
Mark Littlewood is like a Fast Show caricature.. is it in fact Paul Whitehouse?!
I'm not the smartest person, but I see two guys here; a guy who thinks he knows it all and a guy who knows he knows it all. I'm with the latter...
No mention of how we're exceeding planetary boundaries. A great demonstration of how economists ignore the context of physics, biology and psychology. We call this the metacrisis.
Who even needs a debate for this. Are our public services fit for purpose? No. How do we fix them? Money. Who has the money? Rich people. How do we get it off them? Tax. It's really not complicated.
It's a wonderful thing watching Mark Littlewood being enligntened by Gary Stevenson. I welcome this debate x
Mark Littlewood's internal struggle between the position he's come from and the postion he's being taken to is like a grubby child being dragged kicking and struggling into a bath.
Well done Gary! The only one at the table with an iota of understanding how ordinary people are being affected by this mess, and the only one with a genuine desire to improve the situation. It's all academic to the others. I burst out laughing when Littlebrain started gushing about fracking at the end. Shows just how out of touch and uninformed he is!
One aspect of all this that isn't mentioned here, is the social cost. The more unequal a society becomes, the more crime, ASB, violence, and division it suffers. I lived in Denmark for while in the late 1990s, a country with a much more equitable economy, and it was a way more pleasant place to live than the UK. People were generally much more content, far less focused on money and status, and just generally decent to one another. I'm not saying it was a paradise, and DK has become more right wing, less equitable, and less tolerant in the years since I lived there, sadly, but I know where I'd still rather live.
Looks like Scotland is set to run that social experiment on our doorstep. It's going to interesting to see how that progresses and how much effort is invested in sabotaging it from south of the border.
Indeed. Your point is explicated very well in the book "The Spirit Level" by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, which has Lots of empirical evidence showing the more unequal a society is, the more social problems a society has.
Exactly the UK is heading to becoming more like South Africa, were wealthy people live in estates with gates and private security to protect them from the poor.
The government should be taxing unearned income such as Land and moving tax away from earned income such as Income.
Tax stagnant wealth.
@@henrydemonfreid1985 examples?
@@kayedal-haddad9294 As you say. Land. Multiple houses / cars / other assets. Tax Wealth.
@@henrydemonfreid1985 Luxury watches. Art. All the wealth people flash online. Tax machine labor. Tax AI. Tax capital at the WW2 rate, how about we do that to start? We live under shareholder capitalism at the moment.
@@jf2176 range rovers too!
I'm with Gary all the way here. What I can never accept though, is the fact that the success of the world's economy is dependent on perpetual growth. Surely with a still growing population and diminishing resources this cannot be sustainable. Also there are currently enough resources and wealth in the world now that no one should live in poverty, but to achieve this we need fairer distribution. For anyone that achieves a certain level of wealth, having more can't possibly improve the quality of their life - some people's greed is insatiable.
We have to realize that greed really is a sin.
Sin is a Christian concept.
@@Frohicky1 Are you sure about that?
@@Waltzhybrid92 Well given you have offered no conflicting evidence, I'd say the statement stands.
@@Frohicky1 the concept of sin is a means of social control and it appears in all religions ie drinking alcohol is a sin for Muslims, killing a cow is a sin to a Hindu.
Poor people are amongst the most greedy.
It never ceases to amaze me that these people see fractional reserve fiat currency as a resource. That they are willing to tear up hectares of woodland to build their wretched houses, not as homes, but as “assets” …. Investment opportunities. If I were not too old to move, and didn’t have family in England, I would far rather live in a part of the world that used its land to provide its population with local-grown organic food, e.g. Cuba.
Cuba😱corruption, extreme poverty, state control. A good place to live if you take all your asset wealth with you. Obviously is you were a Cuban native you would have no asset wealth
Honestly your opinion is so privileged. You have no idea what life is like under Communist dictatorship.
Gary has nailed it, unfortunately. Very rich people do not spend their earnings, they simply increase their capital. I don't blame them, that is the system we are all forced to live in. They are no more free of the system than the rest of us. But this continual flow of currency from poor to rich has to stop somewhere. Carnegie, a ruthless capitalist in his earning years, decided upon retirement to donate his vast fortune to the benefit of the rest of us. He died penniless. Unless other very rich people do this and very soon, the pitchforks will be out. And at the moment, they are simply being cleaned off and oiled. I thank the IEA for Gary's presence and his attention to the coming strife if nothing is done.
Relying on the whims of an old super rich guy seems a very haphazard way to manage society though. How many libraries can you use?
Yes….. that’s why we taxed the spit out of wealth and built these amazing countries……. Then the wealthy reversed it.
45:35 Gary nails the current issues 10 months ahead of time.
Wow. So interesting to watch this now, post Truss and Kwarteng. Because their time came, didn’t it? They got their pm, who immediately announced unfunded iea-style idealogical (unfunded, no sums done) tax cuts for the wealthy, the markets told them where to get off and the uk economy tanked. The iea line for stimulating growth; shrink the state in a cost of living crisis, dig for shale gas, leave the nice billionaires… I mean, didn’t the month of October 2022 alone entirely debunk and discredit these Tufton St headbangers? Gary, your patience with free-marketers is phenomenal. Reality just bounces off them.
Gary you are amazing as usual but this guy is the kind of guy that doesnt want to see the reality, he is the kind of person that looks at numbers and says yeah everything is good, hes not hearing what you are pointing out, the reality on the high street and the people that are struggling to make ends meet and the millions that cannot pay their bills, and its the same people that pay all the tax and keep this country running, he is hand waving away that wealth is not taxed and the super rich dont make money through having a job and earning income, he only starts to accept what you are saying towards the end of the debate to be able to save face.
Littlewood's job is to not notice, although he does briefly speak in favour of a Land Value Tax, different from a property tax of course. In the US, like most countries, they have 1 to 2% annual property tax, so a $100 million flat in NYC would pay between 1 and 2 million dollars a year tax and there's no council tax paid by renters.
Just be honest, The Scandinavian model is the one to follow. Higher taxes, Very good services/societal contentment and less disparity between haves/have nots. The two nations with the highest disparities are those with higher levels of M.Health issues, crime, etc… This isn’t rocket science. The “personality” of UK and US is simply rotten at its core and has been forever, never moreso than this past 40 years.
Less middle class than uk per capita it a shit system
Indeed. Your point is well explicated in a book called "The Spirit Level" by Richard Wilkiinson and Kate Picket. I recommend it.
@@fidomusic Cheers, I’ll seek it out.
What I really enjoyed here is that Gary was invited on to what seems to be neo-liberal econ show/podcast and whilst Gary holds a different viewpoint he was listened to attentively, treated respectfully, and Mark did engage the discussion in good faith. It was civil. We don't see this on say, Fox News, in the States. For these reasons, I found this refreshing. I do see the zero-sum nature of things as central to Gary's thesis and a point of difference between the two. It was touched on briefly but the conversation diverged immediately after, I wish it hadn't. This is a difference in the two economic perspectives that has profound implications.
22:34 When Gary points out that the Top 1% of taxable income earners are not the same as the richest Top 1%, there's a very telling moment of delayed comprehension. It reads like they've never thought of that distinction in this context before. They've been trained to not think about that segment of people, or their influence on our economy and institutions.
Brilliant talk. So refreshing to see well informed people actually talking .
Fascinating. I commented and deleted a few times as I watched then read some of the comments. I don't think Mark wanted to address himself to what Gary was saying so much as deflect. Real people's problems seem to need to be swerved by Mark. Mark is comfortable asking Gary what he would do but doesn't feel he really needs to offer up solutions himself or express the need for an outcome other than growth. For Mark the status quo is basically working and 'those people' as he describes them are fundamentally not particularly relevant. In Marks eyes it seems that we should not be interested in the direction of travel that growth takes, it just needs to happen and 'those people' are fortunate flotsam if they get growth. It was great to see Gary prick the Singapore on Thames bubble too with a clear explanation of how high levels of migrant labour are left out of the figures.
I love the way Mark appeals for a smaller state. I didn’t notice him do that when the big State bailed out the big banks and the super rich. I guess that’s where Gary began.
Tax avoidance should be a crime and the system should have the ability to imprison the criminals and give justice to the country and public.
The easiest way to transform the tax system is to get rid of every tax except INCOME tax and make the definition of income tax money that comes from anywhere. ie. whatever money you make from ANY source it's income. The clue is in the word: INcome. And it should be progressive. ie. the more income you make, the more you pay in tax. This isn't hard. The only reason the taxation system is so complicated is so that people can find ways to avoid it by reclassifying income as some other thing.
Excellent this has been one of the best debates I’ve seen for years Thank you all who took part
45:39 has to be, in hindsight, one of the biggest moments of this debate. It's so frustrating watching the reflexive dismissal by Mark Littlewood. Nearly 2 years on from this debate, look where we are.
There is twice as much land in the UK taken up by golf courses than there is housing. Seize the golf courses and build council housing on them. There's also 10 times as many empty houses than homeless people by the way.
IEA: Look over there! nothing to see here...leave my sponsors!..i mean the billionaires alone. I appreciate that they hosted this though.
"So base it on reality" Go Gary!
I came into this assuming I'd dislike Mark Littlewood but really loved the push back he gave and while I am 'team Gary' I really liked how this discussion wasn't cliche Good vs Bad and Right vs Wrong or simply binary. Great stuff
Gary tells it as it is, he doesn't seem to be wasting his time with labels or ideological fluff about the goodness or badness of free markets. The crux of the matter is: if we don't start taxing the very rich properly and thereby cut down inequalities, the country (more than one country, actually, because the trend is not confined to the UK), will be unlivable for most people
To the notion that the UK needs spending cuts, pre-COVID the UK spent about 15% less per capita than the US (in USD terms) and is about the 25th highest spender per capita. Would be hard to spend less and maintain a NHS of any form.
When benefits take over wages then this proves that people are not being paid enough to survive on and that wages have been kept to low for to long. Zero contract hours didn’t help either. Therefore the Governments austerity model caused this imbalance. The real minimum wage should be at least £20 per hour. We don’t have enough jobs that pay enough to pay the bills and to keep a roof over peoples heads. Privatisation and destroying industries and the jobs that went with them is criminal. We need to bring back industries into public ownership and out of the pockets of investors. Well done Garry One Year later your Predictions have been proved right.
Great conversation
laughable that someone could argue 'well the systems works fine for me' with a straight face and treat it as if its any kind of credible economic analysis.
I’d be interested to know about Gary’s experience in Tokyo. I’ve lived in Tokyo for over ten years after getting priced out of London rentals, and I’ve always thought rents were much more affordable in Japan. I rent a 2-bedroom “2DK” for what a single room in a similar flat cost in London in 2008. Looking at some official data, a studio in Barking & Dagenham averages £730/ month, the lowest listed. A one-room apartment in Adachi ward averages £309/month, the lowest listed within the “23 wards” that are considered inner Tokyo. It’s also not a country where a property is seen as an investment, as buildings are typically demolished after 25-30 years. Combined with a declining population, there’s not much upward pressure on rents or house prices.
I live in Tokyo Prefecture (not the city) and what you say is spot on. Inheritance tax here is far higher than in the UK and I think that helps. When I told my American friend how much rent we pay for our two bedroom apartment she said, "Stay in Japan". Australia might be even worse than the UK; rents and property prices there are astronomical.
I find it difficult to believe that it takes so long to get to the point that assets aren't mobile, and it's the assets which are appreciating
Wealth is created by work, whether this is digging something out of the ground, making something that brings a benefit or providing a service. The vast majority of people are involved in these activities, from highly qualified professionals to unskilled workers. If these people do not receive a sufficient proportion of the wealth they create, as happens when the very rich (who do not fall into this category) just move money between themselves, the economy dries up and eventually the rich have no one they can sell to. Collapse is inevitable!
8 months ago Gary predicted the heating catastrophe dead on with the IEA looking clueless as ever. Amazing.
Good discussion guys
What Gary describes so clearly and irrefutably with real world examples is what people on the economically progressive side of the isle have been saying for literally generations. It is great to see him articulate the problems so clearly, but I wish it wasn't the case that a significant percentage of the population across the world has been so successfully gaslit over the last few decades that it sounds to them like news.
"We're just trying to look at this through different ends of the telescope" Mate there's only one right way to look down a telescope
The British Tax system needs to be simplified, raise the tax free allowance by 20% all earnings below £90000 ,taxed at 20% all earnings above £90000 taxed at 35%, close all loopholes, all financial interests even those held offshore must by law be declared, no more non dom status unless you are genuinely only visiting the country to conduct your business here, but not the spouse of the prime minister. Serious consequences for tax evasion, I appreciate that billioniares apparently don't take a wage its all done with loans etc, in that situation the inland revenue can by law estimate how much tax would be paid if the took a wage based on thier companies and other financial interests, I would over estimate to encourage honesty.
A great debate, I feel Mark is obviously a successful individual and could almost see him cringing by the thoughts his wealth and people like him would see a decline in their wealth. Personally I don’t think Mark seemed open at all to seeing super rich people being taxed, which I find rather alarming. Gary is always extremely consistent in his interviews and seems to be one of the few that’s really advocating for the real working and middle class families. One thing I noticed was Marks persistence highlighting our government has to borrow from the wealthy, this is something that should be a warning signal, we should be taxing them so we don’t have to borrow from them, in turn constantly increasing their wealth. I do think there is too much waste within government, perhaps largely due to privatisation and ministers having financial conflicts of interest whilst serving in public office. I’d like to see more debates like this 🙏
Yes mate, these people know that they're getting an easy ride at the moment, the government is filled with these sort of people and they belong to a class of people of this wealth bracket. Privately educated, vast wealth within the family, knowledgeable about how to set up businesses and avoid as much tax as possible and very well connected with the multi national corps who they give tax breaks to and will be working for once they leave the gov. These people aren't going to introduce rules that will hurt their own pocket and hamper their careers once they leave office.
That’s cos he thinks he’s in this ‘rich’ group! So many people (Tory voters) think they’re in the club, you’re not, unless you’re making tens of millions a year you are not in the club and you’re not who Gary is talking about. These aspirational types identify up not down, they don’t realise they’re siding with the wrong team
This is such an important conversation and we need to keep talking about it until we’re so loud the government have to listen. Gary is a gem 💎
I was raised in California, currently living in Ohio… I’m sending the highest praises for this wonderful, knowledgeable, yet beautifully orchestrated w/out anger debate, this praise comes from an aspiring enlightened observer here in US to what I now know as the IEA. This was a breath of fresh air.
Business, big or small, isn't interested in reinvesting profits in R & D, new products and services, and improving workers terms and conditions The bare minimum of profit is left in the business, and the rest is pulled out by owners/shareholders. London and Wall Street encourage that behaviour because MD's are incentivised to elevate short term share prices. How do they do that? Cut costs to the bone, to increase profits and pay out dividends.
Gary is the real deal. Nailing it.
His opponent was the winner here. Gary is ego. Even his last prediction is daft. It's already messed up and we don't need him to predict the glaringly obvious.
Gary made this point elsewhere, but you have to love it. You can disagree with him all you like, but the reality of the situation is going to keep proving him right… as inequality grows, us ordinary ppl are getting poorer and living conditions are getting worse. The undeniable reality of the situation just keeps reaffirming what he is saying, no matter what you argue about
The interviewer is not listening to Gary so much as he is grabbing his window to speak.
Great discussion except it looks like no-one is aware that Switzerland has a wealth tax in combination with the low income tax, exactly as they were discussing as a theoretical ideal. Why not hone in on that?
We have the same problem in Australia, our tax system is probably even more convoluted. Government policy is directly making rich people wealthier and working people poorer. Income is taxed at a higher rate, and there are loopholes to reduce tax involving capital gains and rebates from the ATO if dividends are paid with franking credits. It just isn't right, we have a system that taxes income more than wealth. Its a problem because like Gary said that wealth buys up more property that working people can't afford, working people rely on there income to grow there wealth, but that income is taxed more to pay for government spending. Garys message is plain and simple, we don't want to increase taxation on income but assets of the wealthiest. His point struck a cord, when he mentioned the UKs political values post ww2. Those values that benefited the majority and made society more equal no longer exist.
You could think of both world wars as sudo revolutions. The elite had to empower the workers or the Germans would have invaded & taken their assets off them. That motivated them to run the economy more fairly & pay a proper share. It would be interesting to see how the books balance once the actual destructive losses of fighting the war are set aside.
Government steal half your income when you earn & spend in Australia
Gary is so articulate and very passionate! He's 100% right!
Rishi Sunak is worth around £720m. His tax return suggested 23% tax on his earnings. Most of those earnings are from investments Why a different tax rate for earnings on investments?
I enjoyed this and thought it was balanced. Both made some very good points. These discussions don't have to be one trying to beat the other.
This kind of comment is totally unacceptable on the Internet.
Well done IEA. Truss and Kwarteng believed your shit!
Great Job Gary
If Assets such as homes are getting more expensive, what does that mean for rents?
What happens when you effectively tax corporations? Those companies reinvest their profits into infrastructure and their workforce in order to grow their business. Meaning even if you don't get more tax revenue, there is still a net benefit that comes from taxing corporations.
If you get more tax revenue out of companies, they will have less money to reinvest, who pays corporation tax? Investors in lower returns, workers in lower wages, and consumers in higher prices. So I would argue there is a loss when you tax corporations.
@@ProWhitaker Revenue? We're talking about profits mate. Why would workers get paid less if corporations reinvest in internal growth to avoid paying corporation taxes? Investors will still see a return. Although it's possible they will see higher returns investing in companies that do not meet the thresholds for cooperation tax which could see more investment in small companies which is far more preferable if you ask me. So no, I still don't see a down side in taxing corporations.
Also, although investors would not receive as high dividends if a corporation reinvests rather than posting profits, the value of the stock would improve because reinvesting in internal growth obviously means higher growth down the line so that logic is also faulty. Short term investors might want to realise short term gains but overall that's bad for the economy as short term investors generally create more volatility than long term investors.
@@HopeIsFleeting so are you saying that if corporation tax was higher that would incentivise companies to reduce there net income, eg increasing CapEx, but the unseen is that with higher taxes it would disincentive growth. www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-growth-plan-2022-factsheet-on-corporation-tax/corporation-tax-rise-cancellation-factsheet
@@ProWhitaker First of all, of course the government is going to try and justify decreases in corporation tax. If they couldn't justify their policies they wouldn't be able to get them passed. Second, what effect do you think increases in capital expenditure has on the growth/value of a corperation (generally speaking)?
Only been speaking for a minute & I can tell the guy in the red tie just doesn't get it. You can gamble all you want, but if nobody is putting anything new on the table you can't win unless somebody else loses.
Here’s an idea: force people with excess capital (“the rich”) to invest in productive entities by raising the top taxes rates on wealth and income from investments in assets and extractive industries. Basically back to 1950s taxation when corporate and private investment worked.
So long billionaires. Who would miss you? Their profits do is no good. Unless you want to live in a tax haven.
Gary is the real deal. Billionaires are taxed way less, percentage wise, than middle and low wage earners.