That’s the view of Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), a respected independent think tank. And that’s what makes it worrying.

This isn’t just another left-leaning economist calling for a tax raid on the wealthy. Johnson is a serious, independent voice – and he reckons Reeves has to raise income tax in October.

It would be a seismic shift.

While the overall tax burden has soared to post-war highs, the basic rate of income tax hasn’t budged for five decades.

It was last increased by Labour’s Denis Healey, who pushed it from 33% to 35% in 1975, exactly 50 years ago.

Those rates are unthinkable today – although if Labour sticks around long enough, who knows?

Writing in The Times, Johnson urged Reeves to follow Healey’s lead and take “drastic action” to sort out the UK’s finances.

“If Reeves finds herself in need of more money,” he wrote, “perhaps she should… break the 50-year taboo, be honest and transparent in her choice of tax policy, and raise the basic rate of income tax.”

Johnson didn’t pull punches, either. He said Labour is “trapped by its own absurd mantra that it will never raise taxes on working people”.

He wants that to change. Working people may take a very different view.

Since Healey’s hike, politicians have treated income tax rises as political suicide.

The Tories and then Labour steadily chipped away at it, until it was cut to 20% in 2008. It’s stayed there ever since.

And it’s no mystery why. Add a penny or two in the pound and workers notice immediately. Ministers can picture the headlines.

Income tax is clear, simple and hated.

That hasn’t stopped governments from hiking taxes to post-war highs of course. They just do it by stealth.

Stamp duty is a favourite. It gums up the housing market and stops people moving for work.

Insurance premium tax is another. This punishes people for buying cover for their car, home or holidays.

Then there’s fiscal drag, the Treasury’s quietest con trick. By freezing tax bands while wages rise, millions are dragged into higher tax brackets without a single official “rise”.

Former Chancellor Jeremy Hunt took this to a new level. He froze income tax and National Insurance thresholds until 2028, a move that will cost taxpayers tens of billions.

Yes, he later cut NI by 2p – twice – but voters saw that for what it was: a desperate pre-election bribe.

These backdoor tax grabs are politically safer. But they distort behaviour, hit the wrong people and erode trust.

A one percentage point increase in basic rate tax would raise £8billion. Two points? Over £16billion. It’s straightforward, powerful and for once, transparent.

So what will Reeves do? Probably what every chancellor has done for decades: dodge it. She’s already unpopular enough.

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She might reverse one of Hunt’s 2p NI cuts, calling it a correction to an “unsustainable” giveaway.

But that won’t be popular either. Not when working people feel squeezed and the sickness benefits bill for those who don’t work is ballooning.

The reality is, hiking taxes is just about all chancellors do these days. Even at the cost of crushing growth along the way. That’s why they work so hard to hide it.

Under Reeves, the tax burden is only going to rise. The least she can do is be honest about it. Except chancellors never are.

By contrast, if she ever actually cut tax, she’d shout it from the rooftops. We can dream.