UK Builders Find Support in Labour's Plan to Upgrade Roads and Railways
Companies including Balfour Beatty Plc, Costain Group Plc, Morgan Sindall Group Plc and Kier Group Plc are lined up to win orders after Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves announced £113 billion ($154 billion) of funding for public infrastructure across the UK last month. That includes £39 billion to build affordable homes, £14 billion for the Sizewell C nuclear project in Suffolk and £15 billion for new transport infrastructure across the north and midlands.
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Yahoo
25 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Which European countries have a wealth tax - and does it work?
As Sir Keir Starmer marks a year in Downing Street, a former Labour leader has suggested the prime minister should consider "asset taxes" for the wealthy as a way to regain support. Lord Neil Kinnock said that while the government is working towards "a series of really commendable and absolutely essential policies", they are "barely noticed" amid fury over cuts to the winter fuel payment, controversial welfare reforms and continuing with the two-child benefit cap. He said that a "cloud hangs over the accomplishments of the government... and people are not getting the message", with Labour trailing in the polls to Nigel Farage and Reform UK. Kinnock told Sky News' Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips programme that there are things the party could do that "would commend themselves to the great majority of the general public", including "asset taxes". "By going for an imposition of 2% on asset values above £10 million, say, which is a very big fortune, the government would be in a position to collect £10 billion or £11 billion," he said. Conservative shadow chancellor Sir Mel Stride said he thought a wealth tax would be "the worst thing to do" and opposed the idea of "piling further taxes on the wealth creators". One common argument against wealth taxes is that they drive wealthy people to other countries, meaning less tax collected, but how true is this? Here, Yahoo News takes a look at other countries in Europe with forms of a wealth tax to see what the impact has been. Norway has a net wealth tax, which is defined by American non-profit the Tax Foundation as "taxes on an individual's or family's net assets levied on an annual basis". In 2023, the Guardian reported that a record number of super-rich Norwegians were leaving the country after the maximum wealth tax was increased to 1.1%. Ole Gjems-Onstad, a professor emeritus at the Norwegian Business School, told the newspaper he estimated that those who left the country had a combined fortune of at least NOK 600bn (£43.6bn). In 2025, Alex Recouso, co-founder and chief executive of CitizenX, a private platform helping people find and fund places that will accept them as citizens, put the number at around £39.5bn. He told Australia's Daily Telegraph that this had resulted in a lost £435 million in yearly wealth tax revenue. Norway's municipal wealth tax rate is 0.525% and is calculated based on global assets exceeding a net threshold of NOK 1,760,000 (around £128,000) for single/not married taxpayers and NOK 3,520,000 (around £256,000) for spouses, according to PwC. The state wealth tax rate is 0.475% and is calculated based on assets exceeding a net capital tax basis of NOK 1,760,000 (around £128,035) for single/not married taxpayers and NOK 3,520,000 (around £256,000) for spouses. For net wealth in excess of NOK 20,700,000 (around £1.5 million), the rate is 0.575%. These levies combined brings the maximum wealth tax rate to 1.1%. While many rich Norwegians were reported to have moved to Switzerland, the Alpine country has a wealth tax system of its own. Its tax is levied annually at a regional level and accounts for around 3.8% of the state's annual income, according to the Financial Times. However, the newspaper points out that on the whole, tax in Switzerland is low, varying from canton-to-canton, with the top federal rate at just 11.5%. There is also no inheritance tax at a federal level, although some cantons have their own. This could explain why Switzerland has not had the same exodus of the super-rich as Norway. Spain taxes its residents on its worldwide assets valued at over €700,000 (around £604,000), according to Sublime Spain, a company that helps support people's work and life in the Mediterranean country. However, some autonomous regions including Catalonia have a lower level of €500,000, while some don't have any wealth tax. Percentages vary depending on how much you have in assets, but generally, the wealth tax in Spain is between 0.2% and 2.5%. Spain's central government also introduced a nationwide "solidarity wealth tax" in recent years, ranging from 1.7% to 3.5% on people with net assets exceeding €3 million (around £2.6 million). The Tax Justice Network, a British advocacy group, holds up Spain as a shining example of how wealth taxes can work. It suggests that other countries can raise $2.1 trillion a year by following the example of Spain's "featherlight" wealth tax on the richest 0.5% of households. Using the Spanish structure as a model for its study, the group suggests a tax rate of 1.7% is applied on wealth above the 0.5% threshold; a rate of 2.1% is applied wealth above the 0.1% threshold; and a rate of 3.5% is applied to wealth above the 0.05% threshold. But how well has Spain's wealth tax worked? A review by the Tax Foundation found that in 2022, wealth taxes represented 0.19% of GDP in Spain, compared to 1.19% of Switzerland's. They accounted for 0.51% of the former's total tax revenues and 4.35% of the latter's. In 2023, the new solidarity tax was reported to have raised €632 million in the year, the Budget Ministry said, compared to €1.8 billion raised from all taxes on large fortunes. While these figures are not to be sniffed at, they are a small proportion of the £280.5 billion in total tax revenue raised by Spain that year, according to Ceic Data. Raise taxes or this government will fail, Rachel Reeves's former top adviser warns (The Independent) Another tantrum from the Labour backbenches is inevitable (Sky News) Starmer endorses UN's high-tax manifesto (The Telegraph)
CNN
an hour ago
- CNN
Bessent says tariffs will ‘boomerang' to ‘Liberation Day' levels if countries fail to negotiate deals
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said tariff letters will be sent to about 100 countries over the next several days, as the Trump administration's 90-day tariff pause comes to an end Wednesday. 'If you don't move things along, then on August 1 you will boomerang back to your April 2 tariff level,' Bessent said about trading partners Sunday on CNN's 'State of the Union with Dana Bash.' President Donald Trump has suggested the letters would include duty rates at the current 10% baseline, or as extensive as 70%. Bessent said Sunday the United States would not impose 70% tariff rates on major trading partners. Bessent said that about 100 letters will be sent to small countries 'where we don't have very much trade,' many of which are 'already at the baseline 10%.' Trump on Friday touted letters as the 'better' option for countries that fail to negotiate deals before the July 9 deadline. On April 9, Trump announced a complete three-month pause on all the 'reciprocal' tariffs after insisting historically high tariffs were here to stay. Later that month, he told Time magazine that he had already struck 200 trade deals but declined to say with whom. So far, Trump has only announced deals with three countries: the United Kingdom, which maintained a 10% tariff rate; China, which temporarily paused sky-high duties on most goods from 145% to 30%; and a minimum 20% tariff on goods from Vietnam. In response to the three deals being described as 'frameworks,' Bessent said the upcoming letters 'will set their tariff rates. So we will have 100 done in the next few days.' 'Many of these countries never even contacted us,' he said, adding that 'We have the leverage in this situation,' as the country facing a trading deficit. Bessent said there may be 'several big announcements' this week, but declined to name countries that could reach deals. Bessent pushed back against August 1 as a new deadline. He also described the administration's plan as applying 'maximum pressure.' 'It's not a new deadline. We are saying, 'This is when it's happening. If you want to speed things up, have at it. If you want to back to the old rate, that's your choice,'' Bessent said about America's trading partners, and used the European Union as an example of countries coming to the table after Trump threatened 50% tariffs on EU imports. Economists have warned that Trump's trade war, especially the wide-ranging tariffs on Chinese imports, will increase costs for consumers. Some companies, including Walmart, have said they will raise prices for customers despite pushback from Trump. 'We have seen no inflation so far,' Bessent said on 'Fox News Sunday,' calling such projections 'misinformation' and 'tariff derangement syndrome.' Bessent and other Trump officials have repeatedly argued in recent months that countries like China would bear the cost of tariffs. US wholesale inflation rose slightly in May, driven in part by costlier goods, though tariff-related effects were largely muted. The Producer Price Index, a closely watched measurement of wholesale inflation, showed that prices paid to producers rose 0.1% in May, lifting the annual rate to 2.6%, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released in June. Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, who has blasted Bessent for undermining the economic impact of tariffs, said Sunday on ABC's 'This Week' that tariffs 'will probably collect some revenue' but would come at the expense of higher inflation and less competitiveness for American producers. Also appearing on 'This Week,' Stephen Miran, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said there was no 'lasting evidence' that tariffs imposed on China during Trump's first term hurt the economy and the administration has only 'repeated the same performance' this year. 'Tariff revenue is pouring in. There's no sign of any economically significant inflation whatsoever and job creation remains healthy,' Miran said. CNN's Kit Maher and Alicia Wallace contributed to this report.
CNN
an hour ago
- CNN
Bessent says tariffs will ‘boomerang' to ‘Liberation Day' levels if countries fail to negotiate deals
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said tariff letters will be sent to about 100 countries over the next several days, as the Trump administration's 90-day tariff pause comes to an end Wednesday. 'If you don't move things along, then on August 1 you will boomerang back to your April 2 tariff level,' Bessent said about trading partners Sunday on CNN's 'State of the Union with Dana Bash.' President Donald Trump has suggested the letters would include duty rates at the current 10% baseline, or as extensive as 70%. Bessent said Sunday the United States would not impose 70% tariff rates on major trading partners. Bessent said that about 100 letters will be sent to small countries 'where we don't have very much trade,' many of which are 'already at the baseline 10%.' Trump on Friday touted letters as the 'better' option for countries that fail to negotiate deals before the July 9 deadline. On April 9, Trump announced a complete three-month pause on all the 'reciprocal' tariffs after insisting historically high tariffs were here to stay. Later that month, he told Time magazine that he had already struck 200 trade deals but declined to say with whom. So far, Trump has only announced deals with three countries: the United Kingdom, which maintained a 10% tariff rate; China, which temporarily paused sky-high duties on most goods from 145% to 30%; and a minimum 20% tariff on goods from Vietnam. In response to the three deals being described as 'frameworks,' Bessent said the upcoming letters 'will set their tariff rates. So we will have 100 done in the next few days.' 'Many of these countries never even contacted us,' he said, adding that 'We have the leverage in this situation,' as the country facing a trading deficit. Bessent said there may be 'several big announcements' this week, but declined to name countries that could reach deals. Bessent pushed back against August 1 as a new deadline. He also described the administration's plan as applying 'maximum pressure.' 'It's not a new deadline. We are saying, 'This is when it's happening. If you want to speed things up, have at it. If you want to back to the old rate, that's your choice,'' Bessent said about America's trading partners, and used the European Union as an example of countries coming to the table after Trump threatened 50% tariffs on EU imports. Economists have warned that Trump's trade war, especially the wide-ranging tariffs on Chinese imports, will increase costs for consumers. Some companies, including Walmart, have said they will raise prices for customers despite pushback from Trump. 'We have seen no inflation so far,' Bessent said on 'Fox News Sunday,' calling such projections 'misinformation' and 'tariff derangement syndrome.' Bessent and other Trump officials have repeatedly argued in recent months that countries like China would bear the cost of tariffs. US wholesale inflation rose slightly in May, driven in part by costlier goods, though tariff-related effects were largely muted. The Producer Price Index, a closely watched measurement of wholesale inflation, showed that prices paid to producers rose 0.1% in May, lifting the annual rate to 2.6%, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released in June. Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, who has blasted Bessent for undermining the economic impact of tariffs, said Sunday on ABC's 'This Week' that tariffs 'will probably collect some revenue' but would come at the expense of higher inflation and less competitiveness for American producers. Also appearing on 'This Week,' Stephen Miran, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said there was no 'lasting evidence' that tariffs imposed on China during Trump's first term hurt the economy and the administration has only 'repeated the same performance' this year. 'Tariff revenue is pouring in. There's no sign of any economically significant inflation whatsoever and job creation remains healthy,' Miran said. CNN's Kit Maher and Alicia Wallace contributed to this report.
