Hi ,
Should Norway keep their wealth tax? We often refer to Norway as an example of a country who's doing a better job on inequality than the UK – they raise 1.2% of their total income each year through a wealth tax, equal to around £2.4bn. So why was Monday's election the anti-wealth tax election?
On paper, it sounds like a success. Since 2000, the Norwegian wealth tax has raised more each year and the last government raised the tax to (at a maximum) 1.1%. But what happened next will shock you: dozens, then hundreds, of media pieces about how wealth taxes were bankrupting the country by driving away billionaires and millionaires. Then, Norwegian millionaires saw their fortunes continue to skyrocket (up by 14% last year) and revenues from the wealth tax almost doubled.
Surely that easily disproves the thesis, right? If the super rich continue to grow and Norway's tax revenues increase, surely the "exodus of the rich" attacks would stop? Well, no. In fact, stories about the super rich suffering under the tyranny of paying (at most) 1.1% tax rates on their fortunes are a third area seeing major growth in Norway.
Wealth taxes are rapidly becoming part of a culture war, and Monday's Norwegian elections are something those of us advocating wealth taxes in the UK should pay close attention to. Classic lobby groups, like the CEO-led Action for Norwegian Ownership, and a few ultra-rich tax exiles have continued to flood the media with 'exodus of the rich' stories, but the election also saw the rapid growth of far right anti-tax narratives targeting younger people. Younger tech entrepreneurs led viral content complaining about Norway's "anti-business" tax system, helpfully amplified by Elon Musk. In mock elections at Norwegian secondary schools, the right-wing bloc won a landslide victory led by the far-right Progress Party, pushing actual election winners Labour into third place. Results like that are why Progress sent 430,000 young men text messages encouraging them to vote on Monday.
Complaints about "overworked, underpaid, overtaxed" young men are rapidly growing far-right recruiting tools across the world. Have you ever heard of Nicholas, 30 ans? It's a meme about a well-paid French man who pays higher income tax rates, but feels hard done by because they don't qualify for benefits intended for lower-income people, the pension and social security system that their parents enjoy doesn't exist for them, and asset prices are too high to build wealth. It's a narrative that builds resentment: of older people who benefited from social democracy; of anyone who does qualify for benefits; and especially of migrants, asylum seekers, and refugees. In the UK, people calling themselves HENRY (high earner, not rich yet) spread similar tales. This online radicalisation is something we should think about, especially considering the paid incentives that mean ex-Reform MPs can make £40,000 from just this sort of resentment bait on Twitter.
This combination of well-funded lobbyists and online radicalisation (enabled and amplified by tech oligarchs) has made Norway the latest European country to see their centre-right party (who pledged to keep, but drastically cut the wealth tax) collapse to the benefit of a surging far right party (who pledged to scrap it altogether). A narrow victory for the left bloc means the wealth tax is merely under review.
And of course, the UK's anti-tax lobby has been keen to adopt Norway's playbook, already pumping out articles claiming that Norwegian politicians and businesspeople are "warning" the UK after the horrific Norwegian wealth tax experience...of raising tax revenue from the richest without harming the economy.
That's why we need as many people as possible to join the Make Them Pay protest on 20 September in London! |
