2023-12-25 16:53:20
December 25, 2023
Gemma McGough became a millionaire by selling her tech business. She finds it unfair that she doesn’t have to give up more of her wealth – she is now fighting with other wealthy people for higher taxation.
When Gemma McGough sold her tech start-up a few years ago, she suddenly became a multimillionaire. But the sudden wealth didn’t make the British woman happy. “I never expected I would have this much money. “It felt uncomfortable,” recalls the 43-year-old entrepreneur.
Together with her husband Chris, she founded the certification agency Product Compliance Specialists in Buckinghamshire, UK, and expanded it into a profitable company. When tech companies bring new products onto the market, they get support from McGough’s company: its experts can ensure that the devices meet the respective national regulatory requirements – a lucrative niche market in which the Brit also has compliance with her current company, Eleos leading providers.
But McGough’s mission is not just entrepreneurial success. She also wants to give something back to society, specifically a generous portion of her wealth. McGough is one of a growing number of wealthy people who are practically begging the government to tax them more. In the USA and the UK, an organization has even formed that is solely dedicated to lobbying for a tax on the rich: the Patriotic Millionaires.
The movement originated in America, where it now has hundreds of members. Among them is Abigail Disney, an heiress to the entertainment dynasty of the same name, who describes herself as “too rich”. The 62-year-old granddaughter of Roy Disney, who founded the Walt Disney Company with his brother Walt in 1923, has a net worth of about $120 million. Her bank balance made her unhappy, she once said. Disney therefore began donating and giving away money to charities. They were noble and generous gestures, but they failed to bring about social change – which is why Disney is now trying to convince governments to collect more money from “all the absurdly rich people around the world.”
McGough is a spokesperson the British branch of Patriotic Millionaires. The organization has been making headlines in the Anglosphere for some time now, but the mission of taking from the rich to give to the poor is not only generating interest in Robin Hood’s homeland: in German-speaking Europe, the Viennese Marlene Engelhorn has one Descendant of BASF founder Friedrich Engelhorn, founded a similar initiative. She will soon inherit a sum of millions – and wants to be taxed for it. It cannot be the case, she argues, that her inheritance is tax-free and that the working population bears the majority of the tax burden. Your Taxmenow initiative publicly advocates for tax justice and a fair distribution of wealth.
The Dane Djaffar Shalchi, who became a self-made multimillionaire through real estate, is also calling for a tax on the rich for people like himself. He also sees “excess wealth” as a problem for democracy: the system is far too focused on the needs and interests of the wealthy . In an interview, the entrepreneur with Iranian roots said: “We have to return to a fair system, to a democratic system in which everyone pays their fair share.”
McGough, who lives near London with her three children, hopes for more international cooperation on taxation. “There needs to be a cross-country initiative to put more burdens on people like me who can pay more,” she said. In Great Britain in particular, numerous super-rich people use complex offshore constructs to protect their assets from the tax authorities. In addition to tax justice, McGough also calls for “robust prosecution” of tax avoidance and evasion.
She is still conflicted about her wealth. “It feels like I overcompensated. Being rich suddenly makes you different from other people, and I wonder: Should I have so much more?” After selling her first business, she started a charity. Charity work is “lovable,” but philanthropy doesn’t solve the big problems of our time, says McGough. And this also includes the widening gap between rich and poor, said the Brit.
Last June 500 millionaires from all over the world met in a ballroom at London’s Savoy Hotel for a conference. The patriotic millionaires used the meeting to promote their cause. Advisers to the ultra-wealthy had warned at the event that there was a “real risk of insurgencies” and “civil unrest” if the inequitable distribution of wealth continued to increase – especially at a time when many households around the world are suffering from high energy and living costs.
It is primarily women who fight on the front lines for the mission of the Patriotic Millionaires; among them McGough’s colleague Julia Davies, who also warned at the Savoy Hotel about the consequences of the climate emergency, a crisis that is worsening global poverty and wealth inequality. “Anyone can shirk responsibility,” explained Davies, “but it is the richest in society who can actually do something about it.” The richest people in the world could be “the heroes” in today’s enormous crises.
That’s why the patriotic millionaires, together with almost 300 other super-rich, economists and politicians, called for a global tax on the rich in an open letter to the G20 heads of state. The current inequality has reached a “dangerous level” and is threatening political stability in countries around the world.
The role and responsibility of wealthy people in a society is constantly being debated. They are often seen as scapegoats or crisis profiteers, and now also as saviors or possible heroes. Many wealthy entrepreneurs contribute to a better and fairer society through their actions – by creating jobs, making their companies sustainable and environmentally friendly, or ensuring diversity and inclusion among staff. But McGough doesn’t go far enough.
There is countless evidence that governments do not always use taxpayers’ money wisely and proactively, but often waste this capital negligently, short-sightedly or ineffectively. McGough nevertheless believes that social change can only be achieved with the state and its democratically elected representatives. Their proposals don’t sound too radical: capital gains taxes should be brought in line with income taxes, which they say would bring in £14 billion in additional tax revenue per year – more than British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s proposed increase in social security contributions, which ( once again) particularly affects the average earners who are already the most heavily taxed.
McGough says that many wealthy people are interested in her organization and want to make a contribution, including in German-speaking countries; Nevertheless, the mission of the patriotic millionaires is a difficult one. This is also evident in McGough’s homeland: the next government will most likely be the left-wing Labor Party. But even they have long since buried their plans for a (high) wealth tax.
Gemma McGough, 43, became a multimillionaire through her start-ups and investments in technology companies. She never studied and became self-employed at an early age in order to be the “master of her own destiny” as an entrepreneur. She is co-founder of Patriotic Millionaires UK. patrioticmillionaires.uk
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