American actor Mark Ruffalo, known for playing the Hulk in Marvel films, joined an appeal by 150 wealthy people to be taxed higher, coinciding with the World Economic Forum in Davos.
The actor is one of the latest signatories of an open letter, initially published during a virtual conference in Davos in January and titled “In Tax We Trust”, of which Abigail Disney, one of the heirs of the Disney empire , was one of the signatories.
“While the world has suffered immensely over the past two years, we’ve seen our fortunes grow during the pandemic, but few, if any, of us can honestly say we are paying a fair share of taxes,” the letter reads, updated in order to to coincide with the Davos forum this week.
The group of “patriotic millionaires” behind the appeal claims that the number of signatories to the letter rose from 100 in January to more than 150 in May.
The group’s leader, Morris Pearl, former chief executive of the Blackrock financial group, promised in a statement that he would “continue to press world leaders to heed our call and tax the rich before it’s too late.”
However, Mathias Cormann, president of the OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development), declared on Tuesday (24) at a conference in Davos that taxes on the rich were less effective than other collection measures.
“That doesn’t necessarily generate a lot of financial resources,” he said, explaining that “in terms of political effect, the idea is attractive, but in terms of objectives it is not as effective” as other taxes, for example on real estate.
But according to the president of the aid organization Oxfam, the wealth tax, by contrast, “is far-reaching, and in some countries it has been proven to work.”
The NGO campaigned for a single solidarity tax on the new wealth acquired by billionaires during the pandemic, with the aim of using the generated resources to provide aid to the poorest, until a more permanent tax emerges.
Translation by Paulo Migliacci
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