AGAR: TAX THE RICH? INCLUDE THE UNIONS
California is looking at a wealth tax, and in the Toronto Star , there is a column titled “A wealth tax could transform our world.”
Linda McQuaig writes , “A Canadian wealth tax could constrain the growth of billionaire wealth — and raise $40 billion a year.”
Let’s consider who we are talking about.
Elon Musk, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett.
People reference the difference in the way we as individuals are taxed and the way big corporations are taxed.
The reason for that is to protect the ability of corporations to attract investment, which, if the company is successful, will lead to employment, which is taxed.
Here is where I hopped on board.
If we want to go after big organizations, I suggest the teachers’ union
You might say, “Teachers pay taxes.”
Yes, and so do the 160,000 people who work for Elon Musk, but if it is fair to malign Musk and go after his money, why not the teachers’ union?
OTPP has billions in investments
According to Forbes , “The Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP), one of the largest institutional investors representing teachers, holds net assets of $279.4 billion.”
Tax 10% of that and we have almost $30 billion a year to spend on – oh here’s an idea – education.
By the way, one of the places the teachers’ union is invested is in SpaceX.
So, if we tax Elon Musk’s wealth, we would be attacking the teachers’ union’s wealth as well.
Why didn’t we tax FIFA? They will make millions off their adventure in Canada; we didn’t grab part of that. Instead, we just threw money at them.
The University of Toronto has an endowment of $3.6 billion. Grab some of that.
Authors highlight wealth of private foundations
An organization called The Breach published a book entitled, Cancelling Billionaires Before They Cancel Us: The Urgent Case for a Wealth Tax .
They complain that the rich hide their money in private foundations. They want to tax those amounts, and they write, “So, if Canada’s wealthy have little interest in helping the poor, where do they distribute their money?”
They go on to list the “top 10 recipients and the amounts they received from Canada’s 50 largest private foundations from 2018 to 2022,” starting with the University of Toronto and include:
- University Health Network—$115 million
- Technion (Israel Institute of Technology)—$97 million
- United Jewish Appeal—$82 million
- Friedberg Charitable Foundation—$73 million
- Schroeder Ambulatory Centre Foundation—$68 million
- McGill University—$62 million
- BC Parks Foundation—$54 million
And their list goes on.
Their conclusion is, “The priorities of Canada’s super-wealthy are quite different than the priorities of ordinary Canadians when it comes to what causes they support. But when the granting is done through the tax system, the Canadian public isn’t really aware that millions of public dollars are going to some of the wealthiest, least-needy institutions in the world.”
They take it for granted that as much money as possible should be declared public money.
I don’t hate the rich, even if they are a union pension fund.
But if you are on board with taxing the rich and the growing notion that billionaires should not be allowed to exist, you have to go along with taxing all of the rich, not just the ones you don’t like.
Or we could get serious about government bloat and waste.
2026-07-14T01:05:11Z
