Colombia extends its wealth tax

[Judi Lynn]

Colombia extends its wealth tax

by Tyler Cowen on September 17, 2014 at 11:03 am in Current Affairs, Economics, Law | Permalink

Colombia is one of the world’s most unequal societies. Last week, the government of Juan Manuel Santos, who began his second term as president in August, announced the extension of a wealth tax introduced in 2002 to pay for the mounting costs of the country’s 50 year drug-fuelled guerrilla war.

“In that sense, we are actually ahead of the curve of what Piketty proposes,” says Mr Cárdenas.

…“This touches only 50,000 Colombians out of the entire population” of 48m people, he says, “that is less than 1 per cent of the population.”

President Santos himself is a product of that 1 per cent. A US-educated economist and member of a wealthy family of the Colombian establishment, he heads up a centrist administration, not a Venezuela-style leftist regime.

Mr Santos has increased rates for various tranches of the levy, in some cases by 50 per cent. Those with a net worth of between $510,000 and $1.5m must pay a 0.4 per cent tax. The rate rises to 2.25 per cent for net worth above $4m. That applies to 45,000 businesses and about 1,000 individuals, Mr Cárdenas said.

More:
http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2014/09/columbia-extends-its-wealth-tax.html#sthash.0lNnZNBb.dpuf

[Louisiana1976]

1. There was a thread yesterday about Charlie Rangel calling for a war tax. I think such a tax should

be levied on the wealthy. The poor and middle class are being squeezed enough.

[valerief]

2. 60% of the discretionary U.S. taxes goes to war already. Paid for by the poor

and middle class, along with their lives.

[Paolo123]

3. I think the DOD budget should be paid as a separate item on income taxes.

Let your paycheck say:

Gross Salary: 2,000
Income tax: 400
FICA: 100
Medicaid: 100
Defense Budget: 300

Or whatever the breakout would be. I think the Republicans would be a lot less interested in war if this was the case.