This week, she announced that she would establish a citizens' council in Austria to receive 25 million euros ($27.4 million) from her estate and decide on its redistribution.
“I have this money just because I am in this particular family in this world, and the government has a mission to ensure that wealth is distributed unequally in society so that it is not unequal in my hands.” Because I couldn't do it. With this last name,” Engelhorn, 31, said at a German-language press conference.
She belongs to a small club of the world's super-rich who advocate for tax justice by demanding higher taxes on the top 1%. In 2021, she co-founded Tax Me Now, a collective of German-speaking wealthy people to address the extreme inequality resulting from tax policy. Engelhorn says heirs like her don't pay inheritance taxes, so they give little of their wealth back to society.
“In Austria, the richest 1 percent of the population accumulates up to 50 percent of net worth. This means that one-hundredth of society owns just under half of the wealth,” she said in a statement. mentioned in. “And 99 percent of people have to make do with the other half.”
She is a descendant of Friedrich Engelhorn, who founded BASF in Germany in 1865, now one of the world's largest chemical companies. According to her initiative “Guter Ratfür Rückverteilung” (Good Advice for Redistribution), the funds she donates come from her inheritance received from her grandmother. It wasn't immediately clear how much of her fortune she would keep after donating $27.4 million. A spokesperson for Guter Rat declined to comment on her net worth.
Austria abolishes inheritance and gift taxes According to a study by the Washington, D.C.-based Urban Institute, the United States has no federal inheritance tax, but a small number of states do impose an inheritance tax. The Internal Revenue Service and some states impose estate taxes on the transfer of property upon death.
As a first step, invitations were sent to 10,000 citizens across Austria. Guter Rut said he will join the council this week, adding that 50 people will be chosen to best reflect the country's demographics. Engelhorn said scientific experts will also advise the council.
Mr. Engelhorn is not a member of the council. Her organization says it is free to decide how the funds are used. Guter Rut said members of the group will be paid $1,317 for a six-day weekend, and meetings will be held in Salzburg from March to June.
How to fairly tax billionaires is a topic of debate in the United States. A 2021 White House analysis concluded that America's 400 wealthiest households paid an average of 8.2% of their income in taxes between 2010 and 2018. [what] Many ordinary Americans are paying,” the White House said in a statement.
Kate Brady contributed to this report.
