Wealth tax on UK’s super-rich could raise £10bn a year, Andy Burnham told

Academics said the wealth tax would affect fewer than 1,000 of the richest UK households. Photograph: Alex Segre/Alamy View image in fullscreen Academics said the wealth tax would affect fewer than 1,000 of the richest UK households. Photograph: Alex Segre/Alamy Wealth tax on UK’s super-rich could raise £10bn a year, Andy Burnham told New prime minister urged to introduce 2% minimum charge on households with more than £100m in wealth A wealth tax on the UK’s super-rich households could raise £10bn a year, according to academics who urged Andy Burnham to include the measure in his plans to “make tax fairer” and pay for better public services. The sum could be raised through a 2% minimum charge on households with more than £100m in wealth and would affect fewer than 1,000 of the richest UK households, according to the study by Gabriel Zucman , a professor of economics at the Paris School of Economics, and Ben Tippet, a lecturer in economics and wealth inequality at King’s College London. Burnham has hinted that a wealth tax could be part of his 10-year plan for the UK, though his close advisers have focused on a rise in the threshold of capital gains tax to match income tax to raise extra revenue. ‘Good growth in every postcode’: Burnham’s economic to-do list in seven charts Read more The new prime minister, who will lay out his tax and spending plans later on Tuesday, said recently that he wanted to avoid creating fresh divisions in society, but that he would consider how to tax people “in a fair way”. Speaking to footballer-turned-podcaster Gary Lineker last week, Burnham said : “I do believe we need a greater sense of fairness and people feeling things are being done in the right way, but at the same time I don’t want to be perceived as someone who is coming in with grudges and agendas and demonise one group.” The academics’ proposal for a wealth tax would force HMRC to calculate the accumulated wealth of the UK’s richest families, including property, private businesses and pension wealth, art, land and charitable assets over which they have control. Their report said: “The objective is not to create a broad-based wealth tax affecting millions of households but rather a focused tax on extreme wealth that can make billionaires pay the same tax rates as the rest, raise meaningful revenues and dampen runaway inequality.” Zucman, who is also an economics professor at the University of California, Berkeley and is known as “the architect of the global wealth-tax movement”, said: “Given the small numbers of households that would be taxed, the UK government could implement this quickly.” Zucman’s studies have shown that households with incomes of £100m or more have the means to avoid most current taxes on wealth, using holding companies, charitable trusts and transfers between family members. Tippet said: “The report shows that a well-designed minimum tax on the very wealthiest households is a realistic, targeted reform that would make the UK’s tax syst