{"id":322740,"date":"2025-12-03T13:30:12","date_gmt":"2025-12-03T13:30:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/322740\/"},"modified":"2025-12-03T13:30:12","modified_gmt":"2025-12-03T13:30:12","slug":"swiss-voters-reject-inheritance-tax-after-billionaires-threaten-exodus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/322740\/","title":{"rendered":"Swiss Voters Reject Inheritance Tax After Billionaires Threaten Exodus"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\tVoters in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/t\/switzerland\/\" id=\"auto-tag_switzerland\" data-tag=\"switzerland\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Switzerland<\/a>, the home of art world mainstays Art Basel and Hauser &amp; Wirth, emphatically voted down a new inheritance tax on Sunday, with 78 percent voting no.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\tThe proposed tax, which came from the country\u2019s left-wing Social Democrats party, would have taxed all inheritances and gifts of more than 50 million Swiss Francs, or about $62.3 million, at a rate of 50 percent. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\tAhead of the vote, Swiss billionaire Peter Spuhler told Swiss newspaper Tagesanzeiger that his family would struggle to pay an inheritance tax as their wealth is tied up in several companies, including train manufacturer Stadler Rail, which he founded. Spuhler threatened to leave the country if the tax passed.<\/p>\n<p>\t\tRelated Articles<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"c-lazy-image__img lrv-u-background-color-grey-lightest lrv-u-width-100p lrv-u-display-block lrv-u-height-auto\" src=\"https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/themes\/vip\/pmc-artnews-2019\/assets\/public\/lazyload-fallback.gif\" data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/IMG_6464.jpg\" alt=\"View of an art fair with a sign that reads 'Hi!'\" data-lazy- data-lazy- height=\"\" width=\"\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\tIn a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/amp\/2025\/11\/28\/swiss-voters-to-decide-on-inheritance-tax-rise-for-ultra-wealthy.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">recent CNBC piece<\/a>, multiple experts and figures in Swiss wealth management warned that other ultra-wealthy people would also leave the country, with Swiss economist Stefan Legge describing such people as \u201clike queens on a chessboard\u201d\u2014in other words, \u201cvery mobile.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\t\u201cThey have tons of options to optimize their taxes,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\tGeneva is home to one of the world\u2019s oldest and largest freeports, storage facilities not subject to customs laws. That, combined with the presence of Art Basel and Hauser &amp; Wirth and favorable tax laws for the ultra-wealthy, make it an attractive place for art collectors to reside, or at least park some of their wealth. <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\tThe country <a href=\"https:\/\/www.economist.com\/europe\/2025\/11\/30\/switzerland-votes-decisively-against-inheritance-tax\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">has nearly 10 billionaires <\/a>per 1 million inhabitants, one of the highest such rates in the world, according to a UBS report. And there are currently <a href=\"https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-collectors\/top-200-profiles\/?filter_top200year=2025&amp;filter_top200location=switzerland&amp;page=1\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">over a dozen figures<\/a> currently listed on ARTnews\u2018s Top 200 Collectors list based in or with residences in Switzerland, including the Niarchos family, Augusto Perfetti, Maja Oeri, and Ryan Zurrer, among others.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ a-font-body-m     \">\n\tAt least for now, they can rest easy. There\u2019s no inheritance tax coming from them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Voters in Switzerland, the home of art world mainstays Art Basel and Hauser &amp; Wirth, emphatically voted down&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":322741,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[45,49,48,133,131,132,834],"class_list":{"0":"post-322740","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-finance","12":"tag-personal-finance","13":"tag-personalfinance","14":"tag-switzerland"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=322740"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/322740\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/322741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=322740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=322740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=322740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}