Billionaire banker Jamie Dimon supports the Buffett Rule – a policy of raising taxes on millionaires to reduce national debt.

The CEO of JPMorgan Chase said he supports the idea of ​​​​imposing a minimum tax rate of 30 percent on those earning over $1 million annually. This comes as the national debt, which stood at nearly $1 million per American family in 2017, remains a pressing problem.

The road to a trillion dollars in debt

Dimon, who recently expressed concern about persistent inflation, laid out his perspective in a PBS interview on Wednesday, saying that reducing the national debt – which exceeds $35.12 trillion – is possible while maintaining significant spending on defense, infrastructure and earned income tax credits.

“I would spend the money that helps make this country a better country,” said the 68-year-old head of JPMorgan, adding that he was in favor of a “competitive international tax system. And you would maybe raise taxes a little bit, following the example of Warren Buffett. That’s what I would do. And then everything would be fine,” he said.

In 2012, the Obama administration proposed the “Buffett Rule,” which requires households with annual incomes of more than $1 million to pay a minimum tax rate equal to or higher than the average tax rate for a middle-class family.

The rule, which never became law due to opposition from Congress, stems from an interview in which the billionaire investor spoke to ABC News about his concerns about growing income inequality in the United States.

The growing tax gap

Buffett, whose net worth was estimated at $138 billion on Wednesday according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, highlighted the inequality in tax rates. While he himself paid 17.4 percent in taxes, the rate for his secretary Debbie Bosanek was significantly higher at 35.8 percent.

Sitting next to Bosanek, Buffett, who had made his tax returns public to the Disney-owned news channel, said: “I have never had it so good. … In recent years we have been told that a rising tide would lift all boats, but the rising tide has lifted all yachts.”

Then-President Barack Obama invited Bosanek to his State of the Union address in January 2012, where she sat alongside Laurene Powell Jobs and then-First Lady Michelle Obama. However, as wealth inequality has worsened, the tax code has recently become more progressive.

The 2021 IRS report shows significant differences in tax rates between top and low earners:

• Top 1 percent of earners: In 2021, an average tax rate of 25.9 percent was paid.
• The bottom 50 percent of earners: Paid an average tax rate of 3.3%, well below that of the top 1%.

These data reflect the trend of higher-income individuals contributing a larger share of total tax revenues. The United States last recorded a budget surplus in fiscal year 2001, when it posted a surplus of $128 billion.

Since then, a series of crises have contributed to growing national debt, including the September 11 attacks and subsequent wars, the bursting of the dot-com bubble, the housing market collapse and ensuing recession, the auto bailout, the Covid-19 pandemic and other economic challenges.

Debates over tax fairness and government spending are heating up as the country grapples with a growing national debt. To find a sustainable path forward, these pressing issues must be carefully considered.