So here we are, trapped in the new oligarchy. It's too late to rely on income taxes, not if we're going to euthanize enough rentiers to free out politics from their toxic influence and save the human race any of several foreseeable mass-extinction events. Making the ultra-rich poor again is going to require new tactics.

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In Canada, the 1% owns 29% of the country's wealth. The 87 richest families in Canada control as much wealth as the bottom 12 million Canadians combined. This is better than the US (where the 1% own 35% of the country), but not by much:

policyalternatives.ca/wp-conte…

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Can we make a wealth tax work? Here's Hemingway's program for making it work in Canada:

* Make it apply to all wealth equally. No carve-outs for real-estate, which makes it very easy to shift wealth among asset-classes to duck the tax;

* Aim it at the super-rich alone. Avoid even the upper middle-class, who lack the liquid assets to pay the tax and could get wrecked if they have to liquidate their holdings at the same time as everyone else, which will depress asset prices;

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* Use third-party assessments of asset values. Don't take billionaires' word for how much their assets are worth! Canada's got an advantage here, thanks to the Canada Revenue Agency's requirement for financial institutions to report their account holders' income, including capital gains. Canada's also recently created "beneficial owner" registries that record the true owners of assets;

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* Use lifestyle audits: anyone caught engaging in tax-evasion will face severe penalties, as will the enablers at financial services firms that help them

One frequent objection to high taxes is that it encourages capital flight - rich people hopping to another territory to avoid taxation. That's a reasonable fear, given how pants-wettingly terrified the rich are of paying tax.

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Hemingway points out that a wealth tax is different from an income tax - income taxes are levied on the outcome of productive activities, while wealth taxes target accumulated wealth. High income taxes can starve a country of the capital it needs for a productive economy, but that's not the case with wealth taxes.

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Hemingway points to the OECD's Common Reporting Standard, through which more than 100 countries have agreed to share financial information, which will help Canada catch billionaires as they funnel their wealth offshore. Meanwhile, if the rich try to move *with* their money, we can hit them with an exit tax, like the 40% that Elizabeth Warren has proposed.

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It's an article of faith that the rich will move offshore at the first hint of a wealth tax, but the research shows that rich people often have reasons to stay that trump their taxophobia. The economic effect of rich people Going Galt is pretty darned small:

warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economic…

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