The millionaire exodus myth

A millionaire exodus widely reported by news outlets around the world, and credited for the UK Labour government’s decision to weaken tax reforms, did not occur this report finds.

Over 10,900 articles were published across print, broadcast and online news in 2024 mentioning an ‘exodus’ of millionaires and/or Henley & Partners’ claims on millionaire migrations.

To understand the reported phenomenon and its divergence from the existing literature, the Tax Justice Network examined the Henley Private Wealth Migration Report’s finding and analysed media coverage on the report’s subject matter.

These are our three key findings.

1. Despite the headline-grabbing claims made, Henley & Partners’ own reports reveal that a millionaire exodus did not occur. The reports find millionaires to be highly immobile, with an effective near-0% rate of migration. In addition, none of the stated findings provide any evidence that tax played any role in any relocation of wealthy individuals.
2. Second, we find serious, unanswered questions over the methodology used to generate the data in Henley & Partners’ reports; over the claims made about the results that the methodology generates; and a number of inconsistent or entirely contradictory claims. Any discussion or reporting of the findings should only proceed with considerable caution.
3. Thirdly, we find that media coverage of the Henley & Partners reports, especially in UK media, has gone far beyond any claims made in the reports themselves, contributing to an entirely unfounded narrative about the role of tax and government policies in causing a millionaire ‘exodus’ which itself did not occur. This reporting of the supposed findings is likely to have contributed to damaging policy decisions by the Labour government in particular.

We expand on each of the above findings in this report. We make recommendations for great caution about Henley & Partners work to the public, to governments and to responsible media outlets.