Taxes at the top: Understanding what high earners pay and options for reform
By Arun Advani, Helen Hughson and Andy Summers (2026)
Debates around tax in the UK tend to assume any significant increase in revenue must come from raising the main rates on one or more of the ‘big three’: Income Tax, National Insurance and VAT. At the same time, the personal tax system is perceived as top heavy with limited scope to ask those at the top to contribute more. Recent budgets show how binding these tenets have become.
Taxes at the top brings together new descriptive analysis with insights and costings from recent CenTax publications, newly updated for the latest tax year. We examine how much tax those at the top really pay, looking at total remuneration which accounts for all taxable income and capital gains and the personal taxes paid on them.
The report sets out several reforms available to the Government at the next budget that could raise additional tax without increasing the main rates of any of the ‘big three’ – rebalancing taxation at the top while removing distortions that currently harm economic growth. These include:
- A policy package for structural reform and equalisation of Capital Gains Tax.
- Equalising the taxation of investment income by applying National Insurance Contributions (NICs) to profits from investments such as rental and savings income.
- Taxing partners and employees equally by applying NICs to partnerships.
- Reforms to the design of the £100k childcare cliff-edge.
This report is funded by the Nuffield Foundation as part of a three-year project, Broad Shoulders.
