Yes, the rich must start paying their fair share of taxes

## Summary
‘If this legislation had been enacted last year, Elon Musk would have owed $42bn more in taxes, leaving him with just $792bn to survive.’ Photograph: David Swanson/Reuters View image in fullscreen ‘If this legislation had been enacted last year, Elon Musk would have owed $42bn more in taxes, leaving him with just $792bn to survive.’ Photograph: David Swanson/Reuters Yes, the rich must start paying their fair share of taxes Bernie Sanders We need a 5% wealth tax on America’s 938 billionaires. In America today, billionaires now pay a lower effective tax rate than the average worker. Elon Musk paid an effective tax rate of less than 3.3%, while the average truck driver paid 8.4%. Jeff Bezos, now worth $223bn, paid an effective tax rate of less than 1%, while the average firefighter paid 8.7%.

## Article Content
‘If this legislation had been enacted last year, Elon Musk would have owed $42bn more in taxes, leaving him with just $792bn to survive.’
Photograph: David Swanson/Reuters
View image in fullscreen
‘If this legislation had been enacted last year, Elon Musk would have owed $42bn more in taxes, leaving him with just $792bn to survive.’
Photograph: David Swanson/Reuters
Yes, the rich must start paying their fair share of taxes
Bernie Sanders
We need a 5% wealth tax on America’s 938 billionaires. Over a ten-year period, this bill would raise much-needed $4.4tn for public coffers
N
ever before in American history have so few had so much wealth and power. Today, the top 1% owns more wealth than the bottom 93%. One person,
Elon Musk
, worth $805bn, owns more wealth than the bottom 53% of American households. And that inequality is getting worse. Last year alone, after receiving the one of the largest tax breaks in history from Donald Trump, 938 billionaires in America became $1.5tn richer. Since he was re-elected, Trump and his family have become $4bn richer.
Never before in American history have we had such concentration of ownership. While profits soar, a handful of giant corporations dominate virtually every sector of our economy, charging higher and higher prices for the products they sell. Four Wall Street firms combined – BlackRock, Vanguard, Fidelity, and State Street – are the major stockholders of more than 90% of American corporations.
Never before in American history have so few billionaires controlled what we see, hear, and read in the media – both legacy media and social media. Never before in American history have we seen a ruling class, within a corrupt campaign finance system, wield the kind of political power it has today. In the 2026 midterm elections, just 50 billionaires have already spent over $433m to influence political campaigns and buy candidates who represent their interests.
Bottom line: the richest people in America have never ever had it so good.
That is one reality. Here’s the other reality.
The American working class has been under savage attack for years. Over the last many decades there has been an explosion in technology and a huge increase in worker productivity. Despite that, the average American worker is making almost $20 a week less today than he or she did 53 years ago, after adjusting for inflation.
According to the Rand Corporation, over the last 50 years, $79tn in wealth has been redistributed from the bottom 90% to the top 1%. Almost all of the gains in worker productivity have gone to the top 1%.
Meanwhile, 60% of our people are living paycheck to paycheck and are struggling to pay the outrageously high cost of rent, healthcare, prescription drugs, groceries, childcare, and the basic necessities of life. Nearly half of older workers have nothing saved for retirement, and over 20% of our seniors are trying to make it on less than $15,000 a year. Tragically, 85 million Americans are uninsured or underinsured and over half a million go bankrupt each year because of medically-related debt.
Why, in a nation of such extraordinary wealth, exploding technology, and greatly increased worker productivity, are so many people struggling just to stay alive?
One of the major reasons is that we have a tax code that is totally rigged – written by representatives of the wealthy to benefit the wealthy. Instead of raising enough revenue to meet the needs of working families, corporate lobbyists have riddled the tax code with loopholes, allowing the wealthiest people and largest corporations in our country to avoid paying their fair share.
In 2006, Warren Buffett famously said: “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”
Buffett went on to say that he, a multibillionaire, pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. What Buffett said was true 20 years ago. It is even more accurate today.
In America today, billionaires now pay a lower effective tax rate than the average worker. Elon Musk paid an effective tax rate of less than 3.3%, while the average truck driver paid 8.4%. Jeff Bezos, now worth $223bn, paid an effective tax rate of less than 1%, while the average firefighter paid 8.7%.
Michael Bloomberg, worth $109bn, paid an effective tax rate of just 1.3%, while the average registered nurse paid 13.3%.
And Warren Buffett? His tax rate was just 0.1%, while the average schoolteacher paid 9.8%.
But it’s not just billionaires who are not paying their fair share. Last year, after Trump gave corporate America a tax break of more than $900bn, Tesla, SpaceX, Palantir, Ticketmaster, and the company that owns Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and Kentucky Fried Chicken paid zero in federal income taxes. These companies combined are worth $3.5tn. Their owners are worth more than $853bn. They made more than $17bn in profits last year. And they paid nothing in federal income taxes.
The American people are catching on.
In California, by a 2-to-1 margin,

---

## Expert Analysis

### Merits
- One of the major reasons is that we have a tax code that is totally rigged – written by representatives of the wealthy to benefit the wealthy.
- In America today, billionaires now pay a lower effective tax rate than the average worker.
- Elon Musk paid an effective tax rate of less than 3.3%, while the average truck driver paid 8.4%.
- Jeff Bezos, now worth $223bn, paid an effective tax rate of less than 1%, while the average firefighter paid 8.7%.

### Areas for Consideration
N/A

### Implications
- In the 2026 midterm elections, just 50 billionaires have already spent over $433m to influence political campaigns and buy candidates who represent their interests.
- In other words, despite raising an enormous amount of money that could improve life for hundreds of millions of Americans, the wealthiest people in this country have so much wealth that they would barely notice the difference.
- We may have democracy, or we may have wealth concentrated in the hands of a few, but we cannot have both.” Let’s choose democracy over oligarchy.

### Expert Commentary
This article covers tax, america, wealth topics. Notable strengths include discussion of tax. Readability: Flesch-Kincaid grade 0.0. Word count: 1402.