Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) reintroduced legislation on Tuesday designed to rake in trillions of dollars in tax revenue by targeting “ultra-millionaires” worth more than $50 million.
Warren first introduced the legislation in 2019. This time around, co-sponsors include other members of the progressive Left, such as Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). Progressive Caucus Chairwoman Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-PA) are leading the effort in the House.
Specifically, the “ultra-millionaires” legislation would levy a 2% annual tax on the net worth of households and trusts between $50 million and $1 billion and a 3% tax on the net worth of households and trusts above $1 billion.
“Today I’m re-introducing my Ultra-Millionaires Tax so that when someone makes it really big — earning over $50 million — they have to chip in 2 cents on the next dollar,” Warren posted Tuesday on social media. “That means [Amazon CEO] Jeff Bezos can’t keep paying lower tax rates than public school teachers.”
Warren is known for her initiatives to target the wealthy. Like past iterations of the bill, the legislation in question would also impose a 40% “exit tax” on those worth in excess of $50 million who attempt to side-step the tax by renouncing their U.S. citizenship.
Also in the bill is a $100 billion infusion of funding for the IRS, which is designed to equip the tax collecting agency for audits better. The Inflation Reduction Act, which passed in 2022 without Republican support, included a controversial provision that allocated $80 billion in new funding to the IRS.
In 2021, the Penn Wharton Budget Model projected that Warren’s legislation would raise some $2.7 trillion over the next decade. The bill would reduce gross domestic product by 1.2%, according to the modeling.
The reintroduction of the “ultra-millionaires” tax comes after President Joe Biden called for higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations in his annual State of the Union address and subsequent release of the White House’s 2025 budget proposal.
Biden’s budget includes raising the headline corporate tax rate from 21% to 28%. The 2017 tax cuts, championed by then-President Donald Trump, lowered the corporate rate from 35%.
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Biden also wants to raise the corporate minimum tax from 15% to 21% and introduce more stringent limits on corporations’ ability to deduct wages of high-paid employees, according to the White House.
In the latest budget request, the White House also calls for a 25% minimum tax for billionaires. That provision would only affect the wealthiest 0.01% of taxpayers, according to the White House.