John,
Last week, America’s 500 richest people grew their wealth by $304 billion, setting the record for largest single-day gain ever recorded. Elon Musk alone added $36 billion to his fortune.[1]
What triggered this bonanza? Donald Trump telling his supporters to buy stocks just before he announced a tariff “pause”. After a deep dive earlier in the week, the stock market surged. And because the richest 1% of households owns most of the market and were given a heads up by President Trump, they cashed in. Not by lifting a finger. Not by doing a day’s work. But by simply existing at the top of a rigged system that rewards wealth over work.
It’s time for that to change. On this Tax Day, Americans for Tax Fairness Action Fund is demanding that Congress introduce and pass legislation to tax the wealth gains of billionaires, so the richest Americans finally pay their fair share.
Previous proposals by our champions in Congress, including versions of a Billionaire Minimum Income Tax and Billionaires Income Tax, would ensure that the ultra-wealthy are taxed on their income regardless of whether they sell their assets or not. Each of these bills would raise more than half a trillion dollars over the next decade, allowing us to invest in working families, including in housing, healthcare, childcare, and more.[2]
And most importantly, they would restore basic fairness to a system that’s now rigged so completely it allows billionaires to grow richer by the day without contributing a dime back to the country that made them rich.
It’s time for the richest Americans to be taxed not just when they choose to sell, but when they profit. This Tax Day, tell Congress: introduce and pass legislation to tax billionaire wealth gains.
This is the heart of the crisis: our tax system treats asset growth as untouchable while immediately collecting taxes on the wages of working families. And Congress has failed, year after year, to fix it.
Under current law, billionaires will pay nothing in taxes on last week's record-setting windfall. So while working Americans are taxed on every paycheck, billionaires avoid taxes on most of their income simply by not selling their stocks.
This status quo is unsustainable. As billionaires hoard untaxed wealth, they fund political campaigns that protect their advantages, rewrite the rules of the economy, and dismantle public institutions brick by brick. In the 2024 election alone, just 100 billionaire families spent $2.6 billion to influence the presidential and congressional races, securing policy influence while paying effective tax rates far below those of working Americans.[3]
What does it mean when $36 billion can appear in one man’s bank account overnight, and no tax bill ever arrives? It means we’re no longer living in a democracy, we’re living in an oligarchy propped up by a broken tax code.
Congress must act now. Taxing the wealth gains of billionaires is the most direct way to rebalance our economy, reduce inequality, and restore trust in a system built to serve the rich.
Thank you for demanding Congress act to introduce and pass legislation that finally taxes billionaire wealth.
David Kass
Executive Director
Americans for Tax Fairness Action Fund
[1] Billionaires Score Best-Ever Day as Stocks Soar on Tariff Pause
[2] BillionairesTax.org
[3] Billionaires Buying Elections: They've Come To Collect
