Millionaires around the world call for higher taxes to aid coronavirus recovery

A group of 83 millionaires from seven countries released an open letter to governments, calling for a permanent tax increase on the very wealthiest to help pay for the global recovery from the COVID-19 crisis.

The letter praises the essential workers who have been on the frontline of the crisis and highlights the role that the richest people in society can play in helping to rebalance the world economy. In it, the group urges governments to raise taxes on millionaires and billionaires "immediately, substantially and permanently," Oxfam reported.

The signatories said that while they weren’t the ones caring for the sick, restocking grocery store shelves or delivering food, they could provide the money needed by the world as it recovers from the crisis.

Prominent signatories include the founder of the Warehouse Group, New Zealander Sir Stephen Tindall, British screenwriter and director Richard Curtis, American film producer and heiress Abigail Disney, Danish-Iranian entrepreneur Djaffar Shalchi, American co-founder of Ben and Jerry’s Jerry Greenfield, award winning German start-up investor and philanthropist Dr. Mariana Bozesan, and American former managing director at Blackrock Morris Pearl.