We have long talked of the last/next desperate acts of a government in demise as being total repression and confiscation of assets - an ugly endgame indeed - and so today, as The Independent reports [2], UK's Nick Clegg is proposing a 'Super-Rich' one-off tax. In a very Buffeett-esque speech, Clegg admonished that "people of very considerable personal wealth have got to make a bit of an extra contribution" as the UK remains mired in a "longer economic war rather than a short economic battle." Interesting Churchillian word-choice. The action is designed to ensure that very high asset-wealth is reflected in the tax-system in a way it is not right now and as one would expect he is not making much progress with his more conservative coalition partners, though ever optimistic he adds he is trying to forget the past and aim for the 'sunny uplands' - which we assume will be lit brightly with the excess blubber of fat-cats if he gets his way.
Via The Independent [2]:
A radical one-off tax on the fortunes of the rich has been proposed by the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg in a move set to anger Tory backbenchers before the new political season has even begun.
Warning that the UK had become mired in "a longer economic war rather than a short economic battle", the Liberal Democrat leader said in an interview that "people of very considerable personal wealth have got to make a bit of an extra contribution".
"In addition to our standing policy on things like the mansion tax, is there a time-limited contribution you can ask in some way or another from people of considerable wealth so they feel they are making a contribution to the national effort?" he asked rhetorically. "The action is making sure that very high-asset wealth is reflected in the tax system in the way that it isn't now."
The idea is likely to raise the hackles of his Coalition partners, especially as it has been floated at the end of a summer which has seen the greatest friction yet between the two parties in power.
...
"Frankly, there are a group of people who don't like any government in power and are always going to shout betrayal. We have lost them and they are not going to come back by 2015. Our job is not to look mournfully in the rear-view mirror and hope that somehow we will claw them back. Some of them basically seem to regard Liberal Democrats in coalition as a mortal sin."