On March 20 2012 12:08 ampson wrote: Sounds like France, similar to the U.S.A, has no real excellent candidates. If I lived over there, I would vote Sarkozy for a lack of a better option (mostly because his economics are slightly more sound than Hollande and he supports nuclear power).
Hollande though sounds like a serious nutcase "His list of policies includes the creation of a band of income tax set to 75% for the income exceeding 1,000,000 € per year"
"He also advocates reducing the share of nuclear power in electricity generation from 75 to 50% in favor of renewable energy sources."
I would never ever ever vote for this guy was he in my country.
How does it make him a nutcase ? Do you even know how does taxation work in France ? There are tons of estate investment that provide tax exemption (Besson bill, Scellier amendment, Robien bill, etc.). Basically, you buy an apartment, and up to 65% (with de Robien bill) of the total value of the apartment is deducted from your taxable revenue. Obviously only very rich people can afford those "gifts". People with high income don't pay more tax than people with low income. People who pay the more tax in France are middle-class and higher middle class. 75% of the income exceeding 1M€ is perfectly fine to me.
Regarding nuclear energy, I'm mitigated, doing what Germany did was retarded (closing nuclears plants to re-open coal plants instead until something cleaner was found). I think nuclear energy is pretty good. But investing in renewable energies is a decent way of creating jobs and restructuring economy, so I'm all for it.
You do have to be careful not to destroy too many jobs in the nuclear sector in the process, otherwise the net gain in jobs will be zero.
The thing that worries me regarding the 75% tax is that it goes right into confiscation of wealth territory. Not only it equates the rich to horrible people, but if you also take into account that he wants to bring back the fortune tax, people may very well be taxed for nearly 100% of their income. How is that in any way fair, and how will it stop the rich from simply emigrating and spending their money elsewhere?
Well, the new 75% taxation is only a new slice of taxation, the share of the revenue under 1M€ will not be taxed more than before. Unfortunately many misinformed people in France think it means 75% of their revenue will be taken by the treasure....
What about the tax exemption investments I mentioned ? You can even cumulate tax exemption investments. Each of those tax exemption can get you up to 8% of the total value of the investment each year.
Let's say you earn 1.3M€ a year (assuming a part of your income isn't paid through tax exempted stock options, which is actually frequent for people earning that much). You are currently supposed to pay a 550k€ income tax. (I used the online "calculateur d'impôt sur le revenu").
With all tax exemption programs that exist you'll end up paying something like 420k€, which is barely 30% of your total income. 30% is more or less what middle class and upper middle class salary pay, because they can't afford those "gifts".
With Hollande's proposition, someone earning 1.3M€ would pay close to 50% of tax, instead of 30%, thanks to this new slice. Sounds fair to me.
It's funny you mention tax evasion. Isn't Sarkozy a very good friend of Johnny Halliday (old French super rockstar) who spends 50.1% of the year in Switzerland so he doesn't have to pay French income tax ?
I get that it's 75% for the part above 1M€ only -- but it still means that you're not allowed to earn more than that or you get it taken away. Tax exemptions is not a sufficient excuse; in fact they're supposed to be there to incite people to invest their money instead of hoarding it. If too much tax exemption is a problem, than just put a cap on just how much you can be exempt; problem solved. For the record, I am also of the opinion there are too many ways to get tax exemptions, but it doesn't mean they are all bad.
Regarding tax evasion, if France takes a page out of the American IRS and taxes people living abroad the difference between foreign taxes and what it would have cost in France, the problem will be partially alleviated, but then again people will perhaps abandon their French nationality altogether.
I just want the socialist party go get their head out of the Marxist mindset that the rich are the source of all problems in the country. It's just like the school system: if people have an easier time learning things, that's baaaad. Better dumb things down so that the baccalaureat doesn't mean anything anymore as a diploma.
...
Gneh, it's late, I'm getting cynical. :-/
I think Hollande's proposition is more of a symbol that shows politics can also be outraged to see that CAC40 CEOs salaries increased by 34% this year while people struggle to make ends meet.
Measures to prevent tax evasion can be good, most candidate include at least one in their program by the way, but it has to be done well, in order not to confuse tax dodgers and people living abroad 100% like.
I totally agree with you regarding school system. Baccalaureat already doesn't mean anything anymore They keep suppressing jobs in educational system. My mum was an elementary school teacher, she resigned last year when she was announced her class year would have 32+ pupils.
On March 20 2012 09:55 ulan-bat wrote: Right-wing Sarkozy said a few days ago "I just discovered that big companies don't pay any taxes in France, that's bad." (source: last week's Weekly Zapping).
If the president himself can "discover" such a thing after 5 years at the top of the state, I guess there is something to be done there.
Exactly THIS :> CAC40 companies have beaten their profit records in 2011... Happily not paying taxes.
And lololol for the increase in TVA while reducing the patronal charges, do people honestly believe the companies will increase the wages as sarkozy advertised ? Of course not, they'll increase their margins and pay shareholders even more, not investing because of the crisis either. This was already tested in other countries, and failed.
Sarkozy's measures he announced are not bad by any mean, it's just that...... he did the exact opposite in the last 5 years, and it's so blatantly OBVIOUS he's lying... He's not gonna change his policy 180° suddenly... The people who say he reduced the tax rates fail to see how they increased for regular people, like... drastically. I'm a soldier, state-payed. In 3 years, my "wage point" didn't increase by even 1%, it stayed blocked (which means reducing my spending power in regards to inflation), AND I pay like 80€ more each more in taxes. That is to say in 3 years, my salary actually DECREASED. (from 1460 net to around 1380 net...) Yeah, he reduced taxes guys... and increasing spending power :> :> make me dream, go on.
Sarkozy's measures he announced are not bad by any mean, it's just that...... he did the exact opposite in the last 5 years, and it's so blatantly OBVIOUS he's lying... He's not gonna change his policy 180° suddenly...
If we take a look at François Hollande's program:
-In 2007 he publicly criticized Sarkozy's program to not replace one out of two civil workers who retire. In 2012 when asked about this, he says he will continue this policy except for education and justice (why education more then culture ? why justice more then interior affairs ?)
-In 2007, he publicly criticized Sarkozy's immigration politics as being too harsh. In 2012 he says that their are still too many immigrants coming to France.
-In 2008-2009 he was out in the streets protesting against the retirement reforms lead by Sarkozy. In 2012 he says he will keep the same reform except instead of limiting the special treatment to people who started working at less then18, he extends it to 19 year-olds and less.
-Regarding nuclear power, his conviction is that we should keep the nuclear power plant as they insure France's energy independence and there are currently no other reliable sources of energy besides coal and petrol. However, as he as sold himself out to "the greens", he has promised that 24 nuclear reactors will be shut down. In effect however, this will only lead to one effective shut down in the next 5 years
Basically we have a candidate that has publicly condemned every decision from the government that was hard to make, but which in fact will continue to use said reforms. And I won't even talk about all of the back and forth the PS had between the "primaires" and today as they struggle to find a coherent line of thought on subjects such as the golden rule, participation in NATO, "quotient familial", and so on...
On March 20 2012 12:08 ampson wrote: Sounds like France, similar to the U.S.A, has no real excellent candidates. If I lived over there, I would vote Sarkozy for a lack of a better option (mostly because his economics are slightly more sound than Hollande and he supports nuclear power).
Hollande though sounds like a serious nutcase "His list of policies includes the creation of a band of income tax set to 75% for the income exceeding 1,000,000 € per year"
"He also advocates reducing the share of nuclear power in electricity generation from 75 to 50% in favor of renewable energy sources."
I would never ever ever vote for this guy was he in my country.
How does it make him a nutcase ? Do you even know how does taxation work in France ? There are tons of estate investment that provide tax exemption (Besson bill, Scellier amendment, Robien bill, etc.). Basically, you buy an apartment, and up to 65% (with de Robien bill) of the total value of the apartment is deducted from your taxable revenue. Obviously only very rich people can afford those "gifts". People with high income don't pay more tax than people with low income. People who pay the more tax in France are middle-class and higher middle class. 75% of the income exceeding 1M€ is perfectly fine to me.
Regarding nuclear energy, I'm mitigated, doing what Germany did was retarded (closing nuclears plants to re-open coal plants instead until something cleaner was found). I think nuclear energy is pretty good. But investing in renewable energies is a decent way of creating jobs and restructuring economy, so I'm all for it.
You do have to be careful not to destroy too many jobs in the nuclear sector in the process, otherwise the net gain in jobs will be zero.
The thing that worries me regarding the 75% tax is that it goes right into confiscation of wealth territory. Not only it equates the rich to horrible people, but if you also take into account that he wants to bring back the fortune tax, people may very well be taxed for nearly 100% of their income. How is that in any way fair, and how will it stop the rich from simply emigrating and spending their money elsewhere?
Well, the new 75% taxation is only a new slice of taxation, the share of the revenue under 1M€ will not be taxed more than before. Unfortunately many misinformed people in France think it means 75% of their revenue will be taken by the treasure....
What about the tax exemption investments I mentioned ? You can even cumulate tax exemption investments. Each of those tax exemption can get you up to 8% of the total value of the investment each year.
Let's say you earn 1.3M€ a year (assuming a part of your income isn't paid through tax exempted stock options, which is actually frequent for people earning that much). You are currently supposed to pay a 550k€ income tax. (I used the online "calculateur d'impôt sur le revenu").
With all tax exemption programs that exist you'll end up paying something like 420k€, which is barely 30% of your total income. 30% is more or less what middle class and upper middle class salary pay, because they can't afford those "gifts".
With Hollande's proposition, someone earning 1.3M€ would pay close to 50% of tax, instead of 30%, thanks to this new slice. Sounds fair to me.
It's funny you mention tax evasion. Isn't Sarkozy a very good friend of Johnny Halliday (old French super rockstar) who spends 50.1% of the year in Switzerland so he doesn't have to pay French income tax ?
I get that it's 75% for the part above 1M€ only -- but it still means that you're not allowed to earn more than that or you get it taken away.
Just... no. If you think high earners wouldn't still be high earners or that the desire/incentive to earn more would disappear because you'd get taxed more after 1M€, you're very mistaken.
On March 20 2012 10:31 Kukaracha wrote: Communism caused the death of approximately 100 000 000 people according to some sources. China's success comes from their capitalist opening, North Korea is a failure, Cuba is a failure, communist Vietnam is a failure, the USSR is a failure, Angola is a failure, etc, etc...
I really don't believe in such theories anymore.
Communism is a social and economic concept. It never killed anybody.
On March 20 2012 12:08 ampson wrote: Sounds like France, similar to the U.S.A, has no real excellent candidates. If I lived over there, I would vote Sarkozy for a lack of a better option (mostly because his economics are slightly more sound than Hollande and he supports nuclear power).
Hollande though sounds like a serious nutcase "His list of policies includes the creation of a band of income tax set to 75% for the income exceeding 1,000,000 € per year"
"He also advocates reducing the share of nuclear power in electricity generation from 75 to 50% in favor of renewable energy sources."
I would never ever ever vote for this guy was he in my country.
How does it make him a nutcase ? Do you even know how does taxation work in France ? There are tons of estate investment that provide tax exemption (Besson bill, Scellier amendment, Robien bill, etc.). Basically, you buy an apartment, and up to 65% (with de Robien bill) of the total value of the apartment is deducted from your taxable revenue. Obviously only very rich people can afford those "gifts". People with high income don't pay more tax than people with low income. People who pay the more tax in France are middle-class and higher middle class. 75% of the income exceeding 1M€ is perfectly fine to me.
Regarding nuclear energy, I'm mitigated, doing what Germany did was retarded (closing nuclears plants to re-open coal plants instead until something cleaner was found). I think nuclear energy is pretty good. But investing in renewable energies is a decent way of creating jobs and restructuring economy, so I'm all for it.
You do have to be careful not to destroy too many jobs in the nuclear sector in the process, otherwise the net gain in jobs will be zero.
The thing that worries me regarding the 75% tax is that it goes right into confiscation of wealth territory. Not only it equates the rich to horrible people, but if you also take into account that he wants to bring back the fortune tax, people may very well be taxed for nearly 100% of their income. How is that in any way fair, and how will it stop the rich from simply emigrating and spending their money elsewhere?
Well, the new 75% taxation is only a new slice of taxation, the share of the revenue under 1M€ will not be taxed more than before. Unfortunately many misinformed people in France think it means 75% of their revenue will be taken by the treasure....
What about the tax exemption investments I mentioned ? You can even cumulate tax exemption investments. Each of those tax exemption can get you up to 8% of the total value of the investment each year.
Let's say you earn 1.3M€ a year (assuming a part of your income isn't paid through tax exempted stock options, which is actually frequent for people earning that much). You are currently supposed to pay a 550k€ income tax. (I used the online "calculateur d'impôt sur le revenu").
With all tax exemption programs that exist you'll end up paying something like 420k€, which is barely 30% of your total income. 30% is more or less what middle class and upper middle class salary pay, because they can't afford those "gifts".
With Hollande's proposition, someone earning 1.3M€ would pay close to 50% of tax, instead of 30%, thanks to this new slice. Sounds fair to me.
It's funny you mention tax evasion. Isn't Sarkozy a very good friend of Johnny Halliday (old French super rockstar) who spends 50.1% of the year in Switzerland so he doesn't have to pay French income tax ?
I get that it's 75% for the part above 1M€ only -- but it still means that you're not allowed to earn more than that or you get it taken away.
Just... no. If you think high earners wouldn't still be high earners or that the desire/incentive to earn more would disappear because you'd get taxed more after 1M€, you're very mistaken.
I don't get what all the fuss is about this particular idea. Everyone knows it's just a demagogical proposition that will never see any practical implementation. François Hollande himself stated a couple of days ago that this measure will bring close to 0 additional income for France. In this video, you can also see him explaining that any taxation above 60% is a terrible idea that can only lead to rich people leaving France (this was one year ago, much has changed in Mr Hollande's head since then...).
On March 20 2012 10:56 Mysti_ wrote: That and Mélenchon is NOT communist, the PG (parti de gauche) has an alliance with the PCF (parti communiste français) but Mélenchon isn't from a communist party.
I'm not talking about Mélenchon, but Artaud.
On March 20 2012 10:46 Supter wrote: Well, i don't think you really understand what "communist" means ... Since single country you talked about were stalinist countries. And approximately everybody admitted that this wasnt the same.
No one reached communism, true, but the road to communism has to go through a violent dicatorship to "clean" the country, which is where stalinism or maois happen.
On March 20 2012 21:28 Agathon wrote: Communism is a social and economic concept. It never killed anybody.
BTW, dictators killed millions of people.
Once again, even Marx wrote that there needs to be a "dictatorship of the people". And this is where the dream becomes a nightmare. "Dictators have killed millions"... be serious for a minute, the only comparable massacre is the one perpetrated by conquistadors in South America, killing more than 70 millions of people. What do you think happens when you violently try to magically change society into its opposite in less than 5 years? Blood and tears.
For Christ sake how can people still believe in that shit nowadays. People never learn. Go ahead, maybe we can reach a billion deaths by 2200.
On March 20 2012 10:31 Kukaracha wrote: Communism caused the death of approximately 100 000 000 people according to some sources. China's success comes from their capitalist opening, North Korea is a failure, Cuba is a failure, communist Vietnam is a failure, the USSR is a failure, Angola is a failure, etc, etc...
I really don't believe in such theories anymore.
Communism is a social and economic concept. It never killed anybody.
BTW, dictators killed millions of people.
I am sorry to burst your bubble, but then you obviously know nothing about communism. It is even possible that you think that you support "communism", whereas in fact you are supporting something completely different (and probably much less despisable).
The central concept of communism is that injustice is prevalennt in the world and that justice cannot be acheived by democratics means, but it is necessary to enforce it inspite of the resistence of the rich minority. Large-scale communism is now proven to be undeployable without dictatorship (only small-scale communism can be with some success achieved "bottom-up").
On March 20 2012 10:31 Kukaracha wrote: Communism caused the death of approximately 100 000 000 people according to some sources. China's success comes from their capitalist opening, North Korea is a failure, Cuba is a failure, communist Vietnam is a failure, the USSR is a failure, Angola is a failure, etc, etc...
I really don't believe in such theories anymore.
Communism is a social and economic concept. It never killed anybody.
BTW, dictators killed millions of people.
I am sorry to burst your bubble, but then you obviously know nothing about communism. It is even possible that you think that you support "communism", whereas in fact you are supporting something completely different (and probably much less despisable).
The central concept of communism is that injustice is prevalennt in the world and that justice cannot be acheived by democratics means, but it is necessary to enforce it inspite of the resistence of the rich minority. Large-scale communism is now proven to be undeployable without dictatorship (only small-scale communism can be with some success achieved "bottom-up").
I was not expressing my opinion about communism. I'm saying that humans are assholes. Reading a book and decide to kill million of people has nothing to do with the book, but with the silly reader.
Go ahead, maybe we can reach a billion deaths by 2200.
Considering 7 billion people are alive in 2012, I would bet on 7 billion deaths before 2100.
Considering the election itself, only 2 candidates actually stand a chance of getting elected and both are conservative enough for their election not to matter much one way or the other. Their term will be constrained by what already exists and driven by external factors, which will have a greater influence than any declaration/opinion made during the elections.
On March 20 2012 12:08 ampson wrote: Sounds like France, similar to the U.S.A, has no real excellent candidates. If I lived over there, I would vote Sarkozy for a lack of a better option (mostly because his economics are slightly more sound than Hollande and he supports nuclear power).
Hollande though sounds like a serious nutcase "His list of policies includes the creation of a band of income tax set to 75% for the income exceeding 1,000,000 € per year"
"He also advocates reducing the share of nuclear power in electricity generation from 75 to 50% in favor of renewable energy sources."
I would never ever ever vote for this guy was he in my country.
How does it make him a nutcase ? Do you even know how does taxation work in France ? There are tons of estate investment that provide tax exemption (Besson bill, Scellier amendment, Robien bill, etc.). Basically, you buy an apartment, and up to 65% (with de Robien bill) of the total value of the apartment is deducted from your taxable revenue. Obviously only very rich people can afford those "gifts". People with high income don't pay more tax than people with low income. People who pay the more tax in France are middle-class and higher middle class. 75% of the income exceeding 1M€ is perfectly fine to me.
Regarding nuclear energy, I'm mitigated, doing what Germany did was retarded (closing nuclears plants to re-open coal plants instead until something cleaner was found). I think nuclear energy is pretty good. But investing in renewable energies is a decent way of creating jobs and restructuring economy, so I'm all for it.
You do have to be careful not to destroy too many jobs in the nuclear sector in the process, otherwise the net gain in jobs will be zero.
The thing that worries me regarding the 75% tax is that it goes right into confiscation of wealth territory. Not only it equates the rich to horrible people, but if you also take into account that he wants to bring back the fortune tax, people may very well be taxed for nearly 100% of their income. How is that in any way fair, and how will it stop the rich from simply emigrating and spending their money elsewhere?
Well, the new 75% taxation is only a new slice of taxation, the share of the revenue under 1M€ will not be taxed more than before. Unfortunately many misinformed people in France think it means 75% of their revenue will be taken by the treasure....
What about the tax exemption investments I mentioned ? You can even cumulate tax exemption investments. Each of those tax exemption can get you up to 8% of the total value of the investment each year.
Let's say you earn 1.3M€ a year (assuming a part of your income isn't paid through tax exempted stock options, which is actually frequent for people earning that much). You are currently supposed to pay a 550k€ income tax. (I used the online "calculateur d'impôt sur le revenu").
With all tax exemption programs that exist you'll end up paying something like 420k€, which is barely 30% of your total income. 30% is more or less what middle class and upper middle class salary pay, because they can't afford those "gifts".
With Hollande's proposition, someone earning 1.3M€ would pay close to 50% of tax, instead of 30%, thanks to this new slice. Sounds fair to me.
It's funny you mention tax evasion. Isn't Sarkozy a very good friend of Johnny Halliday (old French super rockstar) who spends 50.1% of the year in Switzerland so he doesn't have to pay French income tax ?
I get that it's 75% for the part above 1M€ only -- but it still means that you're not allowed to earn more than that or you get it taken away.
Just... no. If you think high earners wouldn't still be high earners or that the desire/incentive to earn more would disappear because you'd get taxed more after 1M€, you're very mistaken.
If you think that increasing taxes to 75% over 1 million is not going to have any effect on people's behavior then you got another thing coming.
On March 20 2012 12:08 ampson wrote: Sounds like France, similar to the U.S.A, has no real excellent candidates. If I lived over there, I would vote Sarkozy for a lack of a better option (mostly because his economics are slightly more sound than Hollande and he supports nuclear power).
Hollande though sounds like a serious nutcase "His list of policies includes the creation of a band of income tax set to 75% for the income exceeding 1,000,000 € per year"
"He also advocates reducing the share of nuclear power in electricity generation from 75 to 50% in favor of renewable energy sources."
I would never ever ever vote for this guy was he in my country.
How does it make him a nutcase ? Do you even know how does taxation work in France ? There are tons of estate investment that provide tax exemption (Besson bill, Scellier amendment, Robien bill, etc.). Basically, you buy an apartment, and up to 65% (with de Robien bill) of the total value of the apartment is deducted from your taxable revenue. Obviously only very rich people can afford those "gifts". People with high income don't pay more tax than people with low income. People who pay the more tax in France are middle-class and higher middle class. 75% of the income exceeding 1M€ is perfectly fine to me.
Regarding nuclear energy, I'm mitigated, doing what Germany did was retarded (closing nuclears plants to re-open coal plants instead until something cleaner was found). I think nuclear energy is pretty good. But investing in renewable energies is a decent way of creating jobs and restructuring economy, so I'm all for it.
You do have to be careful not to destroy too many jobs in the nuclear sector in the process, otherwise the net gain in jobs will be zero.
The thing that worries me regarding the 75% tax is that it goes right into confiscation of wealth territory. Not only it equates the rich to horrible people, but if you also take into account that he wants to bring back the fortune tax, people may very well be taxed for nearly 100% of their income. How is that in any way fair, and how will it stop the rich from simply emigrating and spending their money elsewhere?
Well, the new 75% taxation is only a new slice of taxation, the share of the revenue under 1M€ will not be taxed more than before. Unfortunately many misinformed people in France think it means 75% of their revenue will be taken by the treasure....
What about the tax exemption investments I mentioned ? You can even cumulate tax exemption investments. Each of those tax exemption can get you up to 8% of the total value of the investment each year.
Let's say you earn 1.3M€ a year (assuming a part of your income isn't paid through tax exempted stock options, which is actually frequent for people earning that much). You are currently supposed to pay a 550k€ income tax. (I used the online "calculateur d'impôt sur le revenu").
With all tax exemption programs that exist you'll end up paying something like 420k€, which is barely 30% of your total income. 30% is more or less what middle class and upper middle class salary pay, because they can't afford those "gifts".
With Hollande's proposition, someone earning 1.3M€ would pay close to 50% of tax, instead of 30%, thanks to this new slice. Sounds fair to me.
It's funny you mention tax evasion. Isn't Sarkozy a very good friend of Johnny Halliday (old French super rockstar) who spends 50.1% of the year in Switzerland so he doesn't have to pay French income tax ?
I get that it's 75% for the part above 1M€ only -- but it still means that you're not allowed to earn more than that or you get it taken away.
Just... no. If you think high earners wouldn't still be high earners or that the desire/incentive to earn more would disappear because you'd get taxed more after 1M€, you're very mistaken.
If you think that increasing taxes to 75% over 1 million is not going to have any effect on people's behavior then you got another thing coming.
François Hollande agrees with RJGooner on this one.
On March 20 2012 22:57 LeLfe wrote: whoever gets elected, it's gonna be bad... I'm considering leaving the country tbh
Are you that wealthy ? :D
Don't worry, we get these guys every election. He'll get over it when he realizes that nothing much will change, regardless of who is elected.
no need to be 'that' wealthy to be hopeless with the way the country is run...
As Geiko said I might get over it anyway, as I plan to stay a bit longer in my company, there're lots of opportunities abroad in my field of activity, and I 'm not 'that' attached to France
On March 20 2012 12:08 ampson wrote: Sounds like France, similar to the U.S.A, has no real excellent candidates. If I lived over there, I would vote Sarkozy for a lack of a better option (mostly because his economics are slightly more sound than Hollande and he supports nuclear power).
Hollande though sounds like a serious nutcase "His list of policies includes the creation of a band of income tax set to 75% for the income exceeding 1,000,000 € per year"
"He also advocates reducing the share of nuclear power in electricity generation from 75 to 50% in favor of renewable energy sources."
I would never ever ever vote for this guy was he in my country.
How does it make him a nutcase ? Do you even know how does taxation work in France ? There are tons of estate investment that provide tax exemption (Besson bill, Scellier amendment, Robien bill, etc.). Basically, you buy an apartment, and up to 65% (with de Robien bill) of the total value of the apartment is deducted from your taxable revenue. Obviously only very rich people can afford those "gifts". People with high income don't pay more tax than people with low income. People who pay the more tax in France are middle-class and higher middle class. 75% of the income exceeding 1M€ is perfectly fine to me.
Regarding nuclear energy, I'm mitigated, doing what Germany did was retarded (closing nuclears plants to re-open coal plants instead until something cleaner was found). I think nuclear energy is pretty good. But investing in renewable energies is a decent way of creating jobs and restructuring economy, so I'm all for it.
You do have to be careful not to destroy too many jobs in the nuclear sector in the process, otherwise the net gain in jobs will be zero.
The thing that worries me regarding the 75% tax is that it goes right into confiscation of wealth territory. Not only it equates the rich to horrible people, but if you also take into account that he wants to bring back the fortune tax, people may very well be taxed for nearly 100% of their income. How is that in any way fair, and how will it stop the rich from simply emigrating and spending their money elsewhere?
Well, the new 75% taxation is only a new slice of taxation, the share of the revenue under 1M€ will not be taxed more than before. Unfortunately many misinformed people in France think it means 75% of their revenue will be taken by the treasure....
What about the tax exemption investments I mentioned ? You can even cumulate tax exemption investments. Each of those tax exemption can get you up to 8% of the total value of the investment each year.
Let's say you earn 1.3M€ a year (assuming a part of your income isn't paid through tax exempted stock options, which is actually frequent for people earning that much). You are currently supposed to pay a 550k€ income tax. (I used the online "calculateur d'impôt sur le revenu").
With all tax exemption programs that exist you'll end up paying something like 420k€, which is barely 30% of your total income. 30% is more or less what middle class and upper middle class salary pay, because they can't afford those "gifts".
With Hollande's proposition, someone earning 1.3M€ would pay close to 50% of tax, instead of 30%, thanks to this new slice. Sounds fair to me.
It's funny you mention tax evasion. Isn't Sarkozy a very good friend of Johnny Halliday (old French super rockstar) who spends 50.1% of the year in Switzerland so he doesn't have to pay French income tax ?
I get that it's 75% for the part above 1M€ only -- but it still means that you're not allowed to earn more than that or you get it taken away.
Just... no. If you think high earners wouldn't still be high earners or that the desire/incentive to earn more would disappear because you'd get taxed more after 1M€, you're very mistaken.
If you think that increasing taxes to 75% over 1 million is not going to have any effect on people's behavior then you got another thing coming.
We'll see, especially if the measure to tax high-earning nationals living abroad to make up for the difference in tax levels is adopted. And do you know what actually has an effect on people's behavior? Policies like the circulaire Guéant which drive off promising foreign students looking to study and work in France. Sarkozy and his entourage can't be gone soon enough.
This video means nothing. I'm not even talking about the fact that's it's in french on this english-speaking forum, or the fact that it's a biased video made by the UMP ( Sakozy's party) in order to be caricatural and just try to append the term"liar" on François Hollande. This video just shows that he said one year ago that the very proposition he made about that 75% taxe rate would not have "any effect". Wow. Guess what, everybody knows that this tax rate change would not have a big effect as far as governement debt is concerned. This would not bring lots of money in. No one's denying it. It's a symbolic measure, asking very rich people to show they are helping in this time of crisis, when unemployement skyrockets as CAC40 bosses revenue raises by 34% percent (!!). I don't see contradiction here, only evolution from something that was "not that usefull" one year ago to something that's a good symbol in the current context.
So if we're gonna talk politics here, what about discussing real stuff, instead of going with buzzwords, stupid video and catchy phrases (as most politicians do btw) ?
EPT
