Year after year, greedy corporations use a gimmick known as stock buybacks to artificially inflate their stock price by buying up their own shares. Because over 90% of all corporate stock is owned by the wealthiest 10% of Americans―and over half is owned by the top 1%―whenever corporations use this market maneuver they’re almost exclusively further enriching the already rich.

In 2022 alone, corporations combined to spend a whopping $1.2 trillion on stock buybacks to manipulate the markets for their own gain.

Now, Senators Sherrod Brown and Ron Wyden have introduced the Stock Buyback Accountability Act to encourage large profitable corporations to invest in workers’ wages and benefits, not further enrich CEOs and wealthy shareholders.

This new bill would increase the stock buyback tax from 1% to $4%, generating $20 billion in tax revenue in 2024 alone.