EGN NEWS DESK
After six weekends of deliberating, a bunch of Austrian residents this week determined the way to divvy up the riches of the heiress Marlene Engelhorn, who’s donating the majority of her inheritance to charity in an try to problem a system that allowed her to build up hundreds of thousands of euros.
The Guter Rat für Rückverteilung (“good council for redistribution” in German), a bunch of fifty residents in Austria suggested by consultants, selected 77 organizations that may obtain cash from Ms. Engelhorn’s fortune over the approaching years.
Ms. Engelhorn, 32, made headlines this yr when she turned to the general public to assist redistribute her wealth, difficult the dearth of inheritance tax in her native Austria. In January, she despatched invites to 10,000 Austrian residents, asking them for assist spending 25 million euros (about $26.8 million) of her fortune, which she inherited when her grandmother died. The analysis group Foresight chosen 50 of these residents, from varied backgrounds, to kind the council.
Each group will obtain an quantity starting from €40,000 (roughly $43,000) to €1.6 million ($1.7 million). The teams receiving cash embody the left-wing assume tank Momentum; Attac Austria, a corporation that opposes neoliberal financial coverage; the social group World Inequity Lab; local weather organizations; human rights teams; and dozens of others.
There had been some guidelines in place, in line with the council’s web site. The cash couldn’t be given to teams or people who find themselves “unconstitutional, hostile or inhumane,” and it couldn’t be invested with for-profit establishments. The cash additionally couldn’t be redistributed to group members or “associated events.”
Now that her fortune can be principally given away, Ms. Engelhorn stated in a telephone interview Wednesday, she would not be capable of dwell off her tax-free wealth. She was planning to enter the work pressure and pay taxes.
But, she stated, she remains to be aware that she is coming from a privileged place, even when the contents of her checking account have reduced in size.
“I’ll all the time be a privileged particular person from a rich background,” she stated. “This will not be changeable or deniable.”
Prof. Michaela Moser, a lecturer on the University of Applied Sciences in St. Pölten, Austria, who served as an professional adviser to the council of fifty, stated she was impressed by the extent of engagement, dialogue and — finally — consensus.
The council noticed its mission as two-pronged: develop concepts on how Austrian society can cope with the distribution of wealth, and determine the way to redistribute Ms. Engelhorn’s 25 million euros.
“Twenty-five million — on the one hand it’s rather a lot,” Ms. Moser stated. But, she added, “there are numerous extra organizations in Austria and past that may very well be supported.”
The Engelhorn household’s multibillion-dollar fortune began with Friedrich Engelhorn, who within the nineteenth century based BASF, one of many world’s largest chemical corporations. Another household firm, Boehringer Mannheim, which produced prescription drugs and medical diagnostic gear, was bought to Roche for $11 billion in 1997.
Ms. Engelhorn grew up in a mansion in an elegant a part of Vienna and has lengthy campaigned for tax insurance policies that may redistribute inherited wealth and handle structural financial inequality. Austria abolished its inheritance tax in 2008.
Without any legal guidelines in place that may tax Ms. Engelhorn’s inherited fortune, she determined to redistribute it herself, and he or she turned to the general public to determine how her cash ought to be spent. She is a part of the group Millionaires for Humanity, which advocates wealth taxes, and he or she co-founded a bunch referred to as Tax Me Now.
Before the challenge was introduced in January, Ms. Engelhorn had publicly dedicated to freely giving a minimum of 90 p.c of her inheritance. She is a part of a small motion of superrich people who need to not solely redistribute their cash, but additionally to problem the constructions that allowed them to inherit their riches.
Besides freely giving most of her wealth and “changing into one in every of many,” Ms. Engelhorn stated she would proceed to battle for a extra equal and truthful distribution of wealth in her nation. She stated she hoped that she would make different folks discuss in regards to the concern, too.
“Please speak about cash, everybody,” she stated. “The extra individuals are lively in it, the higher the outcomes can be.”
