We Need to Tax Billionaires

Most working people hand over something like half of what they earn in tax. Billionaires often pay close to nothing in income tax, for a simple reason: almost all of their income arrives through the companies they own, where the taxman rarely reaches it. Gabriel Zucman, the economist best known for tracing hidden offshore wealth, sets out how that gap opened and what might close it.

His answer is a 2% minimum tax levied on the ultra-rich themselves, the proposal now widely known as the Zucman tax, and he argues that the political moment for it has arrived. A clear, pointed book for anyone who suspects the rules are written for the few and wants the numbers and a workable fix in hand.