Wong also conceded that the party had not modelled any wealth flight under the scheme, despite the fact that it would hike income taxes on high earners and levy taxes on landowners of $24 billion a year.
The tax is designed to reduce house prices by 10-15%. The average Auckland sale price is currently about $950,000, meaning the policy would cost Auckland home owners about $140,000 in lost value.
Opportunity also wants to hike income tax rates. Income earned between $50,000 and $200,000 would be taxed at 34% and income above $200,000 would be taxed at 39%.
This pays for a citizen’s income payment of $19,400 a year, which means that most New Zealanders will be better off in income terms each year – although the 66% of households who own a home will be worse off to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost value.
You need to live in New Zealand for five of the last 10 years to qualify for the citizen’s income, which is why people returning home from overseas are left so badly off.
Wong noted that people returning home from overseas often did so not for economic reasons, but to “be closer to family”.
Her answer did not address whether it was fair to hit Kiwis returning to be with family with such high taxes.
Tame noted that 1.5 million New Zealanders were living overseas who might not want to return if they were to be hit with such high taxes.
“I think, if I was putting myself in those shoes and I was looking at coming back to New Zealand and I knew that there were big economic changes that were making this a more prosperous future for me and my kids, I would be willing to pay that tax because I knew I would be better off in the long run and my kids would be better off in the long run,” Wong said.
She said “there was a risk” that many New Zealanders would not return home under her policies but she said this was balanced out by the incentives created by the more productive economy Opportunity wanted to build.
Recent migrants would also be ineligible for the citizen’s income but would face higher taxes.
Wong also admitted that Opportunity had not modelled any wealth flight.
Wealth flight occurs when taxes get so high that people hide wealth or leave the country to avoid paying them. Recent wealth tax proposals from Labour in 2023 and the Greens in 2026 began a public debate on what is a reasonable assumption of wealth flight.
Wealth flight tends to be higher for wealth taxes which are easier to avoid. Land taxes are harder to flee from because it is difficult to hide land and impossible to take it out of the country.
“We haven’t put wealth flight into our modelling,” Wong said.
“The system we are creating is actually more attractive to people with high incomes – if they don’t own property or if they own modest amounts of property, they will be paying less tax because of the citizen’s income,” she said.
In New Zealand, it is relatively common for people with higher incomes to own property.