How much tax does the Prime Minister pay?

On Wednesday the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak revealed how much tax he pays.

Sunak brought in £2 million in 2021 to 2022 – mostly from dividends and capital gains. He paid £432,000 tax on this income. 

This makes the PM’s effective tax rate 22%. That’s the same tax rate as the average nurse making £37,000 a year, as our Executive Director pointed out on Twitter.

This is simply incredible. And it shows precisely what’s wrong with our tax system: the super rich take most of their income from wealth, not work. And taxes on income from wealth are much lower than taxes on work.

“The system is designed to allow wealthy people to pay lower rates of tax”, we told The Times.

What we’re proposing is simple. We want the same rates of tax on income across the board, regardless of its source. So those bringing in £2 million from dividend income should pay the same as those bringing in £2 million from work.

If this were the case, Rishi Sunak’s tax rate would be much higher. If we applied the same rules to every super rich person in the UK, we’d raise £14 billion pounds every year. 

The value of shares, property and gold have hit new highs in the last year. It’s only a cost of living crisis if you don’t own a lot of assets.  

Food prices skyrocket

While the Prime Minister's tax return gives a snapshot into how the super rich are doing financially, the cost of living crisis is getting worse for everyone else. 

The cost of food has increased by 18% since last year, new inflation figures show. Goods and services generally are up 10%.

The skyrocketing cost of the weekly shop is bad for everyone, and is pushing many who were already struggling into poverty. The number of children in food poverty in the UK has doubled this year to 4 million.

This is unacceptable. The UK is a rich country, but wealth is increasingly hoarded by a small  number of super rich people. While wages have stagnated over the last 15 years for everyone else.

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