Washington State enacted a historic “millionaire tax.” IPS analyzed potential impacts of such tax the rich initiatives.
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Washington State has enacted a historic “millionaire tax” — and more states could soon follow suit.
In These Times takes an in-depth look at how levying higher taxes on the state’s highest-income earners would work, and how the revenue from such a measure could help fund key programs and services that help local communities survive and thrive. The article highlights key findings from an older report by IPS and the State Revenue Alliance that examined the potential impact of such a measure. Two years into passing a similar tax the rich initiative, the report found that Massachusetts ended up having more millionaires, not less, and its cumulative wealth grew by $580 billion, according to the report.
A news update from Pacifica Network highlights IPS’s analysis regarding estimated Iran war costs and what that money could and should be used to fund instead.
“It should be clear: funding this unjust, unpopular, and illegal war comes directly at the expense of ordinary Americans,” the IPS analysis explains. “Less than a year after the passage of Trump’s signature ‘Big Beautiful Bill,’ which made deep cuts to Medicaid and SNAP — and right in the middle of an affordability crisis — this is the last thing the country needs. That same bill added $150 billion for the Pentagon, pushing the Pentagon budget over $1 trillion for the first time since World War II — and directly enabling the war on Iran.”
A widely republished CBS MoneyWatcharticle notes the popularity of state-level tax the rich initiatives as Senator Elizabeth Warren introduces a new bill that would impose a 2 percent tax on ultra-rich Americans making over $50 million, raising trillions in revenue that would help fund programs and services that help ordinary American communities survive and thrive.
While millions of American families face a cost of living crisis, billionaire wealth has continued to soar.
CBS cites an older IPS analysis that examines billionaire wealth concentration and how it has grown since 1989. As of September 2025, IPS’s analysis found, the United States’ 905 billionaires were worth a combined $7.8 trillion.
Thanks to skyrocketing billionaire wealth, Warren’s tax on the ultra-rich would raise an estimated $6.2 trillion over the next decade, double the amount projected back in 2021 when Warren first proposed such a measure.
An explanatory video from USA Today’s The Excerpt and an in-depth article in USA Today both highlight IPS’s wealth data research, which found that raising higher taxes on ultra-wealthy Massachusetts residents didn’t result in significant wealth flight — and it ended up raising millions in state revenue to fund vital services to benefit communities.
“Income inequality in the U.S. is surging, reminiscent of the Gilded Age, according to Inequality.org, a project of the Institute for Policy Studies,” Dana Taylor explains in an intro to the video segment for The Excerpt.
In the segment, USA Today reporter Daniel de Visé highlights key takeaways from his in-depth article on the potential impact of wealth tax proposals, explaining how IPS’s research among other analyses has helped bust the myth that a higher tax on high-income earners leads to wealth flight in the states that enact such measures.
Watch the full video below.
An article in Spanish in Prensa Comunitaria highlights IPS’s research that exposes how corporate profiteers exploit the international arbitration system via the investor state settlement dispute (ISDS) model to stack the odds against communities in countries like Guatemala resisting harmful extraction projects.
In an interview with the Cultural Baggage Radio Show, Sanho Tree talks about how the Trump administration exploited myths surrounding fentanyl and drug trafficking to drive forward a new phase in the U.S. drug war with U.S. boat strikes and reckless militarization.
“All of this calamity was enabled by fentanyl lies,” Sanho explains.
In an in-depth article examining Warren Buffett’s shifting approach to philanthropic giving, CNBC cites IPS’s research that found that most billionaire signers of the Giving Pledge have yet to fulfill their promise to give away most of their wealth.
Fortunecited IPS’s research on the impact of 15 years of the Giving Pledge in an in-depth profile of Craigslist founder Craig Newmark and how he made his money and why he’s giving it away. Newmark signed the Giving Pledge in 2025.
The article notes, “The Pledge’s track record is mixed. A 2025 analysis by the Institute for Policy Studies found that the original U.S. signers who remain, billionaires, have collectively become about 166% wealthier (after inflation) since 2010, and only 8 of 22 signers who have died appear to have actually given away at least half their fortunes by the time of their deaths.”
Washington State passed a measure that raises taxes on the ultra-wealthy residents of the state, yielding revenue that will go directly to fund vital programs and services that enable ordinary Washington families to survive and thrive. Multiple states are currently considering similar tax the rich initiatives, and states like Washington could serve as a model.
Omar Ocampo tells Fast Company there’s no evidence that higher state tax rates on the wealthy cause people to leave. “The literature just doesn’t really support the idea that people migrate because of their taxes going up,” he says.
In a powerful segment with Connections with Evan Dawson/WXXI, Chuck Collins shares his personal story of growing up with inherited wealth to make a compelling case for reining in extreme wealth by taxing the rich fairly.
Chuck discusses some key takeaways from his book Burned by Billionaires, in which he highlights how billionaires like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and others have exploited tax loopholes to pay extremely low tax rates while their wealth skyrockets. In fact, some billionaires get away with paying zero dollars in taxes.
Meanwhile, millions of ordinary American families struggle to get by, and the billionaire class has an extraordinary impact on every aspect of our lives, from housing to healthcare to pet care and even our access to the ballot box.
“The concentration of wealth is kind of disrupting everything we care about,” Chuck explains.
It’s urgent that those in power act to rein in extreme wealth by taxing the rich fairly, Chuck warns, and right now, we simply aren’t doing enough. Meanwhile, billionaire wealth is continuing to soar, and billionaires’ extreme influence over our society is continuing to climb, unchecked.
IPS's research exposes how corporate profiteers exploit the investor state settlement dispute (ISDS) model to stack the odds against communities in Guatemala and elsewhere.
CNBC cites IPS's research that found that most billionaire signers of the Giving Pledge have yet to fulfill their promise to give away most of their wealth.
The New York Times cites IPS's research on how many billionaire Giving Pledge signers have yet to live up to their promise to give away most of their wealth.
“When corporations can get away with shifting their employees’ basic living costs onto taxpayers, this is a form of corporate welfare,” the report said. “It means taxpayers are subsidizing business models based on poverty wages.”
“This is highly unpredictable and so we won’t know the cost of it until it’s over,” said Lindsay Koshgarian, program director of the National Priorities Project at the Institute of Policy Studies, who said the conflict is “not necessary” and is taking away from other policies that could “make life more affordable for Americans."
"Our government should always put the best interests and well-being of children first in any policies, decisions, actions, or activities in which kids are impacted."
An in-depth article in Fast Company highlights IPS’s new report, which analyzes the CEO-worker pay gap at the 20 largest low-wage corporations, and spotlights how many of the workers they…
Más de 50 organizaciones nacionales e internacionales alertaron que la intención del gobierno de volver al CIADI podría facilitar la expansión de proyectos extractivos, la entrega de territorios a las ZEDE y otros megaproyectos, y subordinar decisiones estatales a tribunales internacionales.
