Swizz Beatz Thinks Today's Rappers Should Pay 'Taxes' to Hip-Hop Icons

Source: Kevin Mazur / Getty

Swizz Beatz is doing a lot for the hip-hop community right now, spearheading the Instagram live Verzuz battles alongside Timbaland. With that in mind, it’s no surprise this guy has a whole lot of respect for those who founded hip-hop, and he thinks they should get paid for their contributions.

The legendary producer discussed this topic during a conversation with Joe Budden on Beatz’s Zone Radio on Instagram Live.

“I want to raise a million dollars for each icon that started hip-hop…[DJ] Kool Herc on down. The fact we’re not paying taxes on who started hip hop shows we don’t fucking really love hip-hop. The fact we don’t pay taxes as artists to those icons that paved the way took the lower cut for the music that allowed us to feed out families,” Swizz said at around the 9:55 mark in the below video. “We need to be paying taxes to the creatives of hip-hop that gave us freedom of speech to go forward…Melle Mel, Grandmaster Flash and Sugarhill Gang, minimum a million a piece.”

These comments from Swizz came after saying he wanted to do a battle between Rakim and Big Daddy Kane.

At another point in the chat, Beatz did confirm that a Verzuz battle between his wife Alicia Keys and John Legend is also in the works.

Do you think hip-hop legends should get paid by the new school of rappers?