Gary Stevenson took over this week’s Big Issue magazine to argue for a wealth tax, using the title’s pages to push his case against inequality. The 39-year-old, who launched Gary’s Economics in 2020, also dropped into the Big Issue office in London for the takeover.
Gary Stevenson pushes 2% wealth tax on Tonight's Tv sits alongside the magazine feature as the clearest sign of the campaign’s current direction. For readers of the Big Issue, the immediate takeaway is simple: Stevenson is using the magazine itself as a platform, not just a comment or interview slot, to argue for a new tax.
Big Issue and Gary Stevenson
The headline used by the magazine read: “Inside the Big Issue: Gary says wealth tax!” That wording places the tax argument at the centre of the takeover, rather than treating it as a side point. Stevenson is the creator of Gary’s Economics, and the magazine feature gives him a wider audience than a single post or clip would.
Barry Ferns welcomed Big Issue to the Bill Murray comedy pub in Islington, North London, and told Big Issue about his journey from homelessness to running a comedy club. He had to ditch his car and hop on his fold-up bike to arrive in time. That detail gives the takeover a grounded setting: Stevenson’s argument is being presented in the same magazine that reaches Big Issue vendors and readers who follow housing and income issues closely.
England and Wales
The magazine also places the wealth tax push alongside a recent change in England and Wales: rough sleeping is no longer a criminal offence, after the Labour government confirmed on 29 June that it repealed the Vagrancy Act. The law was first introduced in 1824. That timeline matters because Stevenson’s pitch lands in a policy climate where homelessness and punishment are being revisited, not ignored.
Keir Starmer and Andy Burnham are among the political figures named in the broader article context, but no formal wealth tax proposal is set out there. Stevenson says a wealth tax is needed, yet the piece does not turn that into a bill, a rate structure, or a timetable. For now, the practical value for readers is the argument itself: a financial commentator with a large following is trying to move the debate inside a magazine built for people living with the effects of inequality.
What Stevenson wants taxed is broad wealth, but the mechanism is not explained beyond the call for a wealth tax. That leaves the next step with the reader: treat the takeover as a campaign message, not a policy landing point. The unanswered question is whether Stevenson will turn the same argument into a specific proposal with rates, thresholds, and collection rules.
