California’s billionaire tax will ‘kickstart a movement’ that spreads to more states, the federal government and other countries, Nobel laureates say

A ballot initiative that would impose a wealth tax on California’s billionaires could be the start of a global trend, according to six Nobel Prize-winning economists.

In a letter published on Saturday, they endorsed the state’s Proposition 40, which calls for residents worth more than $1 billion to pay a one-time tax equivalent to 5% of their assets.

The letter’s signatories, who have previously backed wealth taxes or higher income taxes on the ultra wealthy, include Daron Acemoglu, Abhijit Banerjee, Peter Diamond, Esther Duflo, Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz.

“California is the right place to take this historic step,” they wrote. “The explosive growth of the state’s billionaires over the past few decades has made it one of the most unequal places in America.”

The economists estimated that California’s 250 billionaires are collectively worth $2.3 trillion, and the state income taxes they paid amounted to only 1.6% of their $1.4 trillion wealth gain from 2019 to 2025.

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