Dan Price, CEO of the credit card processing and financial services company Gravity Payments, told Hill.TV that a billionaire’s tax at the state and federal level could help plug budget shortfalls stemming from the coronavirus pandemic.
“We have a $3.3 billion budget shortfall — the lawmakers have to find that money somewhere,” he said, referring to funding in Washington state. “You can cut schools and kids’ programs, education, health in a pandemic. You can take it from small businesses. You can take it from our dwindling middle class, but none of this stuff makes any sense.”
Late last year, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) announced that the state would implement a millionaire’s tax to help mitigate the economic effects of the pandemic.
Price said a 1 percent tax on billionaires could make a significant difference, calling it an “obvious” solution that would avoid having to “gut” small businesses.
He added that billionaires in Washington state, where Gravity Payments is headquartered, have created structural hurdles that have resulted in the most regressive tax system of any state, with those making the most paying the lowest percentage of income in taxes.
Price said those hurdles prevent the implementation of a more equitable system, even if most people agree on what legislation should be passed.
“Ultimately, we need those long-term structural reforms to be put into place, the same way we do it at the national level, because they are stacking the deck for the billionaires so they can exploit everybody else,” he said.
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