We have been discussing the tax policies of President Francois Hollande’s Socialist government — a record that I have criticized as ruinous from an economic standpoint. A recent report indicates that for some high-earning families — more than 8,000 — the Hollande policies impose a 100% tax. It is the ultimate “eat the rich” policy. Even for those families facing a 75% rate, it is unclear why they would continue to work in the country. Many are not. France is experiencing a flight of both high earners and companies.
The bizarre 100% tax is the result of a one-off levy last year on 2011 incomes for households with assets of more than 1.3 million euros ($1.67 million). The surcharge was imposed shortly after Hollande took office on a promise to hit the rich with high taxes. The Hollande 75% direct tax was so unfair that the Constitutional Council struck it down. However, this report states that the one-off levy effectively pushed some families to a 100% tax.
The newspaper Les Echos found that nearly 12,000 households paid taxes last year worth more than 75 percent of their 2011 revenues due to the exceptional levy. ($1 = 0.7798 euros).
Putting aside how many families are impacted by taxes above 75%, it is in my view an insane, self-destructive economic policy for France. I just spent an evening with a friend and his parents discussing the situation in France. This is a moderate family politically that has long fished in French waters. My friend is now an American citizen but his parents and family remain in France. They recounted how they had to destroy half of their ships because of taxes. They are seeing other businesses doing the same or simply moving out of France. These a patriotic and proud French people but they are watching their government cannibalize off the economy. The government is getting instant revenue while killing revenue producing businesses. It is like eating the grapes and roots of the vineyards of Bordeaux for food and leaving the fields barren.
As someone who truly loves visiting France, it is disheartening to watch Hollande’s cultural war on the wealthy. I favor higher taxes as part of a comprehensive package of reforms in this country and other countries. However, Hollande’s expressed hatred of the rich resulted in a political success and now an economic disaster. It is also grossly unfair to wealth French who love their country and are not opposed to making sacrifices. Hollande played the class card and told the French that their problems were due to a sinister upper class rather than France’s high labor costs and burgeoning budgets. Even if one dismisses this study and the one-year levy, there are still many thousands of families and businesses who face a government demanding 75 percent tax rates.
These policies however will only lengthen the economic crisis. Indeed, France is already viewed as a hostile country for business and that is likely to continue under Hollande who is fighting the French judges to impose taxes higher than what is viewed as constitutional or fair by the courts.
Source: Reuters
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Jodi, There are some voters here in the US that are educable. Please keep posting here explaining what happens when the entitled take over a country. And, as far as where you live. Hell, we have plenty of room, we’re empty nesters. Mr. Turley wants diversity here, so do Davis and myself. We welcome all thoughts.
all I have to say is this: I live in France, we are an average middle-class family…my tax’s and health insurance (based on salary) are so outrageous, we can hardly save any money! Then my tax person tells me the following: 20% of the people in France pay their tax’s!!! Of course my response was…and the 80%?? They are below the rate to pay tax’s…hmmmmm Is it time to move to Andorra??? I have a funny feeling something is not right here….
“They are below the rate to pay tax’s…hmmmmm Is it time to move to Andorra???”
Jodi,
I think Andorra calls and the French would be well rid of you.
Jodi wrote: “Then my tax person tells me the following: 20% of the people in France pay their tax’s!!! Of course my response was…and the 80%?? They are below the rate to pay tax’s”
Hi Jodi. Thanks for your comment from your neck of the world.
We in the U.S.A. are at the 50% mark here, with many trying to cause us to catch up to your country. It is amazing to me that 20% in your country can support the rest of the country. You would be welcome to come here and help us stop these non-productive individuals from voting our country into bankruptcy. We still have some freedom and liberty, but the takers are trying real hard to vote the makers out. Somehow they think the money just appears magically to take care of everyone. They have no notion of hard work.
Whatever reason you think warrants insisting human mental powers are completely unique, it is not needed. The reasons for not causing animals pain, distress or hunger they can obviously feel are self-evident, cruelty is wrong.
That does not mean we cannot raise them for work or use them for food if we do that humanely (my preference); in the wild they have to work, go hungry and are often prey, in much worse circumstances. I am fully certain if they aren’t suffering or miserable being raised in captivity, then they do not imagine a better life for themselves, our food animals aren’t capable of that kind of abstract thinking.
Attempted Repost #4 of part 3:
The dog is conscious. It is not an automaton. I think people have reasoned backward from a desire to justify their exploitation of animals, with a false premise that consciousness has something to do with human rights.
It doesn’t! Even people that are unconscious and may be so permanently still have human rights; consciousness does not confer the right to life any more than having sight or all our limbs.
Attempted Repost #2 of part 3:
The dog is conscious. It is not an automaton. I think Rand and others reason backward from their desire to justify the exploitation of animals, and with a flawed understanding of consciousness as being either fully present at human levels or completely absent, they concluded animals cannot be conscious, cannot have any sense of self, and therefore it is morally safe to force them to work or slaughter and eat them.
I on the other hand believe all animals with a developed cortex are conscious to some degree, tiny or large, but I do not have a moral problem with raising them for work or food.
The entire reason for dismissing animal consciousness is unnecessary, it has nothing to do with human rights. Even people that are unconscious and may be so permanently still have human rights; consciousness does not confer the right to life any more than having sight or all your limbs. If you fall into a coma, it does not make your life, organs and property fair game.
Attempted Repost #1 of part 3:
The dog is conscious. It is not a robot. You have been misled by Rand and others, that perhaps misled themselves: They reason backward from their desire to justify the exploitation of animals, and with a flawed understanding of consciousness as being either fully present at human levels or completely absent, they concluded animals cannot be conscious, cannot have any sense of self, and therefore it is morally safe to enslave them (steal their work) or kill and eat them.
I on the other hand believe all animals with a developed cortex are conscious to some degree, tiny or large, but I do not have a moral problem with raising them for work or food.
The entire reason for dismissing animal consciousness is unnecessary, it has nothing to do with human rights. Even people that are unconscious and may be so permanently still have human rights; consciousness does not confer the right to life any more than having sight or all your limbs. If you fall into a coma, it does not make your life, organs and property fair game.
Attempted repost #1 of part 2:
Specifically, there are three areas of the brain that are implicated in consciousness, the thalamus, the lateral prefontal cortex, and the posterior parietal cortex. Many animals have them, but there is a spectrum of relative size for the two latter areas, and humans are #1 by a large margin. These three areas have more connections to each other and to other regions in the brain than any other region of the brain; especially in humans. The hypothesis most prevalent among those that study consciousness is that “consciousness” consists of this integration of all sensory forms into some kind of whole experience.
But, even though our degree of consciousness is great, the connections also exist in other animals. It may be possible to assign an actual number, a degree of consciousness, by measuring the communications activity between these areas.
Attempted repost #1 of part 2:
Specifically, there are three areas of the brain that are implicated in consciousness, the thalamus, the lateral prefontal cortex, and the posterior parietal cortex. Many animals have them, but there is a spectrum of relative size for the two latter areas, and humans are #1 by a large margin. These three areas have more connections to each other and to other regions in the brain than any other region of the brain; especially in humans. The hypothesis most prevalent among those that study consciousness is that “consciousness” consists of this integration of all sensory forms into some kind of whole experience.
But, even though our degree of consciousness is great, the connections also exist in other animals. It may be possible to assign an actual number, a degree of consciousness, by measuring the communications activity between these areas.
The dog is conscious. It is not a robot. You have been misled by Rand and others, that perhaps misled themselves: They reason backward from their desire to justify the exploitation of animals, and with a flawed understanding of consciousness as being either fully present at human levels or completely absent, they concluded animals cannot be conscious, cannot have any sense of self, and therefore it is morally safe to enslave them (steal their work) or kill and eat them.
I on the other hand believe all animals with a developed cortex are conscious to some degree, tiny or large, but I do not have a moral problem with raising them for work or food.
The entire reason for dismissing animal consciousness and a sense of self is just not necessary, it has nothing to do with human rights. Even people that are unconscious and may be so permanently have human rights; consciousness does not confer the right to life any more than having sight or all your limbs. If you fall into a coma, it does not make your life, organs and property fair game.
Attempted repost #1:
Bron: You are being to specific. For a counter-example, if you won the lottery without any work, wouldn’t you still be excited to actually collect the check? If you were out for a good time, fishing in a river, and found a gold nugget that was yours to keep, wouldn’t that make you happy?
Happiness is not predicated on having worked for it, some happiness is the result of just being fortunate or lucky without any work at all. I was in a casino earlier this month; I sat down to play poker and the very first hand I was dealt two aces in the hole. That made me happy; I did not work for it or expect it, but I felt lucky (and won the first pot).
All animals do have the same basic neuronal structure as we do. We are evolved from lesser animals, and there is a high probability (based on experiments and the still developing theories of the details about how evolution proceeds) that whatever makes us unique from them in thought is only a matter of degree, not of quality.