In Taxing Wealth Report 2024, Funding the Future (formerly Tax Research UK) founder Richard Murphy proposes that wealth in the UK might be undertaxed by up to £170bn a year when compared to income. The proposal is based around income having been taxed on average at 32.9% from 2011 to 2020, but increases in wealth taxes at only 4.1% over the same period – suggesting ‘significant additional capacity to tax in the UK, although only from those with most income and wealth’.
In response, Tax Policy Associates’ Dan Neidle, questions Murphy’s methodology, pointing out that most of the increase in private wealth came from increases in the value of pensions and property (based on ONS data). Taxing paper increases in value (the increases were in the value of the pension – not necessarily the income from the pension, and in the value of the property – not from actual sales of property) would be ‘nuts’, says Neidle, concluding that there is ‘no undertaking here at all’.
In Taxing Wealth Report 2024, Funding the Future (formerly Tax Research UK) founder Richard Murphy proposes that wealth in the UK might be undertaxed by up to £170bn a year when compared to income. The proposal is based around income having been taxed on average at 32.9% from 2011 to 2020, but increases in wealth taxes at only 4.1% over the same period – suggesting ‘significant additional capacity to tax in the UK, although only from those with most income and wealth’.
In response, Tax Policy Associates’ Dan Neidle, questions Murphy’s methodology, pointing out that most of the increase in private wealth came from increases in the value of pensions and property (based on ONS data). Taxing paper increases in value (the increases were in the value of the pension – not necessarily the income from the pension, and in the value of the property – not from actual sales of property) would be ‘nuts’, says Neidle, concluding that there is ‘no undertaking here at all’.
