In today’s newsletter:
Why Britain is poorer than America
The cost of nationalisation
What Burnham owes to Lenin
Daniel Hannan is Director-General of the Institute of Economic Affairs
Is anyone in Britain more insufferable than the ‘Patriotic Millionaires’? These unctuous loadsamoneys take out adverts, sign letters, and sponsor campaigns urging the Government to tax them more, thus indulging in a uniquely hideous blend of virtue-signalling and conspicuous consumption. “I am a better person than you! And, while we’re about it, look at my wad!”
Like so many malign social movements, this one came from the United States and spread through the Anglosphere. Founded in 2010 to campaign, in effect, against George W Bush, it picked up support from publicity-hungry celebs, guilt-ridden nepo babies, and CEOs wanting to improve their images. Now it has inspired a troop of like-minded nincompoops in Britain, led by Gary Lineker, who retired from presenting Match of the Day after inadvertently reposting an anti-Semitic image.
“We can afford it,” declared Gary and a hundred of his mates in a letter published on Thursday. OK, chaps, good for you. So why not pay now? HMRC allows anyone to make additional tax contributions. You could just, you know, pay, instead of demanding to be forced to pay.
Perhaps you are doing so, of course. Perhaps Lineker and Richard Curtis and Val McDermid and Gary Stevenson are cheerfully topping up the Treasury without letting anyone know. But, given the sanctimonious tone of their public utterances, I doubt it.
As a rule, I urge rich people – indeed, I urge anyone – to support good causes of their own choosing rather than handing their resources to an inert state bureaucracy. With the exceptions of defence and criminal justice which, by their nature, need to be administered on a national basis, almost every function that the modern state has taken on can be discharged more efficiently by the private or charitable sectors: health, education, poverty relief, broadcasting, transport.
John Wesley put it well in a sermon in 1789: “Get all you can, save all you can, give all you can.” Unlike the preening plutocrats who sign these letters, he wanted results. He urged his followers to be moral rather than moralistic – to do the right thing rather than to nag others.
How quaint that seems today. Since the spread of smartphones, holding the right opinions has counted for more than doing the right thing. You can be forgiven for cheating on your spouse or underpaying your taxes. You can commit assault or robbery and, once you have served your sentence, that will be treated as that. But woe betide you if you say the wrong thing about, say, race relations. All manner of sins and blasphemies shall be forgiven unto men; but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.
In a largely post-religious age, the idea that words count for more than deeds has taken on a superstitious force. You might give to charity. You might work in a soup kitchen. But express the wrong opinion on the role of multinationals or the status of trans people and none of it will count. Even using one wrong word might damn you.
How should Andy Burnham respond to the Patriotic Millionaires? What, more broadly, should he do about the actors, sports stars, and flâneurs who airily tell us that higher taxes – as if taxes were not already at a postwar high – would make us happier?
I have an idea. Labour should impose a ‘fame tax’. It would apply to anyone with an enviable job: movie stars, TV anchors, pop singers – anyone, basically, who gets paid for doing what the rest of us would regard as having fun. The tax would be high, perhaps an additional 50 per cent of all earnings. It would, however, be wholly voluntary. All that the celebs would have to do not to pay it is to sign a public declaration affirming that they were choosing to opt out. It might make them think twice before telling the world that they are not taxed enough.
Oh, and for anyone who has signed one of these Patriotic Millionaires declarations, there should be a surplus – again voluntary – of, say, a million pounds. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your patriotism.
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IEA Podcast: Director of Communications Callum Price is joined by Director General Lord Hannan and Head of Lifestyle Economics Chris Snowdon to discuss Burnham’s first week and what is going on with the disability rate in the UK, IEA YouTube
This week on Economic Affairs
News and Views from the IEA
The never-ending credit crunch
The UK is now around 40 per cent poorer per person than the US, having been on course for near economic parity as recently as 2007.
Austerity cannot explain the UK’s underperformance: the US pursued a similar policy over the same period
The real cause was post-2009 banking regulation, which fell disproportionately on the UK’s bank-dependent economy, and undermined lending to UK businesses which remains 15% below its early 2008 level
New publication from the IEA by leading economist Tyler Goodspeed lays out the reasons behind Britain’s Great Stagnation
Who’s going to pay the bill for Government largesse? Valentin Boboxc’s calculations about the real price of nationalising energy and water covered in The Daily Mail
The Institute of Economic Affairs, meanwhile, put the cost of nationalising the water industry at £150billion, with another £50billion for energy.
But it added that there would also be £20billion a year running costs, which could mean a 2.4p increase to the basic rate of income tax to cover it.
Dr Valentin Boboc, senior economist at the IEA, said: ‘There is no version of this where the public both takes back the utilities and avoids paying for them – the cost simply moves from the water bill to the tax bill.’
Why Is Britain Poorer Than Every US State? Daniel Freeman interviews Tyler Goodspeed on his IEA briefing on the never-ending credit crunch, IEA YouTube
Post-2008 bank rules crippled UK economy, ex-Trump adviser says, latest IEA research on the causes of Britain’s great stagnation covered in The Times
Kristian Niemietz spoke to economist Bryan Caplan about the how socialist the Nazis were:
Gary Lineker urges Andy Burnham to hike taxes on fellow millionaires, but Callum Price suggested Lineker could make a voluntary donation to the Treasury in the Daily Express
“A new wealth tax is the last thing the country needs. It won’t raise nearly as much money as its proponents say it will, and it will do far more harm than good by deterring investment and putting off the very wealth creators we badly need to turn our economy around. There is a reason that so many countries that have tried wealth taxes ended up ditching them. What’s more, in the UK we already raise more tax as a share of GDP from wealth-related taxes than any other OECD country.
“If so many millionaires are so proud to pay, they can donate to the Treasury voluntarily whenever they like.”