It said figures released by the tax office show almost a third more workers will pay 40% tax or more during this financial year than paid it three years ago – taking the total of higher rate taxpayers to 4.1 million.
The report said about 300,000 of these will pay 50% tax.
However, the report added while the number of higher rate taxpayers would increase – due to a combination of factors including ‘fiscal drag’ where tax bands do not more in line with inflation – the overall number of taxpayers would fall this year from 30.1m to 20.7m.
This is due to more of the lowest paid people being taken out of the system.
Accountants Grant Thornton said higher rate tax used to be paid only by the “genuinely wealthy” however now many middle managers, teachers and middle-ranking NHS executives would also fall into this bracket.