{"id":18116,"date":"2026-04-04T05:50:51","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T05:50:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/?p=18116"},"modified":"2026-04-04T05:50:51","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T05:50:51","slug":"travel-guru-rick-steves-is-happy-to-pay-more-taxes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/?p=18116","title":{"rendered":"Travel guru Rick Steves is happy to pay more taxes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\n

Rick Steves, the Edmonds-based travel author and TV host whose empire of guidebooks, tours, and public television specials has made him a household name, took<\/a> to Facebook on March 30 to celebrate the signing of the so-called \u201cmillionaires tax.\u201d <\/p>\n

His post, complete with a smiling photo of him holding an American flag in his right hand under the words\u00a0\u201cA Millionaires Tax? Let\u2019s Try Shared Prosperity!\u201d went viral almost instantly, racking up over 11,000 reactions and hundreds of comments as it was shared by Gov. Ferguson and Washington Senate Democrats alike.<\/p>\n

\u201cA new tax on fat paychecks like mine was just signed into law in my home state\u2014and I like it,\u201d Steves wrote. For a political debate that had been dominated by warnings of billionaire flight<\/a>\u2014Amazon<\/a> founder Jeff Bezos decamped to Miami in 2023, and Starbucks\u2019 Howard Schultz announced a similar move<\/a> days after the bill passed\u2014Steves offered a strikingly different voice from the wealthy class: one welcoming a higher tax bill.<\/p>\n

The new law, which imposes a 9.9% tax on individual income above $1 million per year, will fund expanded childcare, free school meals for all Washington students, and expanded Working Families Tax Credits for hundreds of thousands of lower-income households. For Steves, who has long been an advocate for progressive taxation and equitable public investment, the math was simple. <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd\u2014for those of us with a heart for the public good\u2014it\u2019s simply common sense,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

He also took aim at Washington\u2019s long-standing tax structure, which relies heavily on a regressive sales tax and has been routinely ranked among the most unequal in the nation for its burden on low-income residents. \u201cIt\u2019s time to change our upside-down tax system,\u201d Steves wrote. <\/p>\n

He\u2019s not the first to frame Washington\u2019s tax code as upside-down, which puts an outsized burden on the poor compared to the wealthy. \u201cWe knew it was going to be a pretty major endeavor,\u201d Washington Rep. Brianna Thomas, a Democrat who supported the measure, told\u00a0Fortune<\/em> the day after she and her colleagues spent 25 hours debating the bill<\/a>. \u201cWe\u2019ve got 93 years of precedent in front of us, behind us, around us at all times on the conversation around an income tax.\u201d

Washington Senate Democrats were quick to amplify the moment, writing<\/a>: \u201cMillionaires like Rick know that we all win with shared prosperity.\u201d <\/p>\n

Whether the law survives looming legal challenges\u2014rooted in a 1933 state Supreme Court ruling classifying income as property\u2014remains an open question. But Steves\u2019 post showed not every wealthy Washingtonian is heading for Miami.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rick Steves, the Edmonds-based travel author and TV host whose empire of guidebooks, tours, and public television specials has made him a household name, took to Facebook on March 30 to celebrate the signing of the so-called \u201cmillionaires tax.\u201d His post, complete with a smiling photo of him holding an American flag in his right […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":955,"featured_media":18117,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[123],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"yoast_head":"\nTravel guru Rick Steves is happy to pay more taxes | Unlock Informed Choices with Us<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The travel icon and millionaire welcomed Washington's new 9.9% income tax on 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