2012-02-29

French Idée du Jour — The 75% Tax Bracket

François Hollande, the front runner for France's presidential elections, has started the class warfare, aiming again at the minority (let's call them, the rich), in order to buy some more votes from the majority of the population (those who are not rich).

He wants to raise income tax rates, and introduce a 75% tax rate for income above 1 million euros.
(Bloomberg) Feb. 29 -- [...] His latest proposal to tax the rich has come under fire. Top earners should pay 75 percent of their income above 1 million euros ($1.34 million) a year in taxes, he said Feb. 27. That’s on top of his proposal to raise the tax rate for people making 150,000 euros or more to 45 percent from 40 percent. 
The most recent tax measure, that Hollande called “a matter of patriotism,” had sparked a debate in France with Sarkozy’s ruling Union for a Popular Movement Party and centrist parties saying it will lead to capital flight.
This is an amazing act of stupidity, as it's been proven time and time again, that beyond a certain level (around 45-50%) increasing the tax rate actually reduces the amount of dollars (or euros, or whatever the currency) levied by the tax. The main reason is that people are not interested in making that income which will be taken away by force, and would prefer to either work less, or make that income go underground.

In addition to that, you create capital flight, and the expatriation of those who are actually producing and spending the most: those bloody bourgeois

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