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
Gene:
I wasnt fast enough, sheeit. 16th degree and quick on the return. LOL
nick:
I am directing the above to Gene about Obama just to be clear.
Bron,
I appreciate your defense of him, I really do. It’s a magnanimous gesture on your part. But the proof is in the eating of the pudding. Inability is not an excuse for breaking the rules.
Gene H:
he tried, he just isnt good at it. Although maybe he is and we just dont know?
ROFLMAO
Oh yeah, nick. You’re a real tough guy. 🙄 You’ve got us quaking in our boots! Or not.
Obsession? Let’s talk obsession. Obsession is the state of being obsessed. Being obsessed is to preoccupy or fill the mind of continually and to a troubling extent: such as your obsession with attempting baseless denigration of others to . . . what end? Make yourself feel better about yourself? Compensate for you intellectual shortcomings? Hide that you can’t argue your way out of a wet paper bag? Simply stroke your . . . ego?
You’re the one displaying a pathological inability to refrain from ad hominem attacks despite being warned time and again that they are against blog policy. That is the salient issue here, nick. You can’t follow the rules. This makes you a bad guest in this salon.
You are obsessed with trying to tear down others who threaten your delusional self-image that you are always the smartest most capable guy in the room. Bad news, sunshine. With the exception of the obvious lunatic fringe, you are far from the smartest or most capable guy in this room. That’s probably Vince Treacy when he’s around, mespo is probably next in line. Between you and Vince are probably a good three dozen regular posters including every single one of the guest bloggers.
My interest as a GB, but not obsession, is in maintaining quality and ensuring what rules we do have are followed. They aren’t many, but they are important.
You keep on the ad hominem line and you will face the consequences of banishment eventually.
Cause and effect.
All are welcome here. Unless they cannot abide by the very few rules this forum has or withstand the scrutiny of a group of critical thinkers unlike any other I’ve seen on the web. Most other blogs would have given you the boot long ago simply for being disruptive. That we tolerate you is an exemplar of this forum’s dedication to free speech. That tolerance does not extend to endless ad hominem fits however. It also doesn’t extend to threats or defamation.
If you can’t learn to respond civilly when it’s pointed out you are factually wrong, using bad logic and/or insufficient evidence in your assertions and then choose to resort to ad hominem as your response, you will need find another forum to participate in as your shelf life here is limited. There was one other person who acted like you here once. Like you, she was given multiple chances to change her ways. As you are proving for yourself with increasing frequency, she was unable or unwilling to change her ways.
She has been gone a long time now.
You’ve been told what the rule is. You’ve been warned unofficially and officially that breaking it is not acceptable behavior. It has been illustrated time and again that your tactic regardless of its origin is futile. There are people here much more capable of giving insult than you and can argue circles around your usually weak logic and always substandard evidence. Get your act together or you will be shown the door at some point, nick. That’s not a threat. That’s a statement of the objective reality of the situation. With every baseless ad hominem attack you offer as a response to you being challenged, you take another step toward the door whether you realize it or not. The effect of the cause as dictated by your subsequent actions is the ball that is in your court.
Learn to attack arguments, not people.
Your move.
God is all knowing perfectly in Jesus represented perfectly by Jesus. Whoever has Jesus in them are learning what God knows. He will teach whoever what they need to know. The prophets of old who saw God without his glory would have immediately recognized him had they be alive when Jesus walked the earth. Know Jesus Know God. It is a lie to think God is unknowable
Bron, I’ve previously stipulated these guys are fairly intelligent. Read their LENGTHY “investigation.” I’ve been within normal limits. I’m always under control. These two are currently obsessed. I appreciate your concern. But, remember what I did for a living. I can handle lightweights like this. I’ve handled heavyweights. I just wish the 3 of us could sit in a bar together. I really think we could resolve all our problems. But, I know they would never agree to that. So, we’ll just have to work it out here. Mr. Turley is smart, wise, and judicious. My stalkers are 1 for 3 in those categories. And, that is the rub. I will give them the last word, hopefully right now, and then we can move on to other dicussions of substance. That’s my hope anyway. This is boring to me, and I’m sure most everyone else.
Thanks for the compliment, Bron, but actually I’d prefer it if nick would follow the rules and learn to attack arguments instead of people. Personally, I don’t think he’s capable of doing it. If he eventually talks himself into a banishment, that’s happy coincidence, but not my primary intention. He’s baking that cake all on his own. If I happen to have some icing handy, so be it.
nick:
one of the hardest things to do is to admit there are people smarter than you in this world. Accept it and move on.
Enjoy the sparing, the more you do, the more you learn and the better you get.
These guys are just toying with you and not very hard, honestly. Gene and Mike S are masters of kung fu mind fukery. 16th degree Zen masters of kung fu mind fukery mind you.
They really are restraining themselves, most probably because of their guest blogger status. They are just trying to trip you up to say something outlandish so you will be cut off for a week or month. The prof is pretty good natured and will let you back if the offense isnt too bad.
So just hoist a beer and drink to kung fu mind fukery. Be the water!
Bron,
Non-responsive. The intent of the ACA was always a handout to the health care insurance industry instead of substantive reform. Corporate welfare is fascism writ large. Also, guilt by association is a weak tactic. I don’t care if his dad was the Easter Bunny. I’m talking about Obama’s actions – which to a one have been corporatist to this point and corporatism is the child of Italian Fascism. Try again.
Really.
I would love for you come up with a concrete example of something he’s done that is even remotely socialist in nature. Has he nationalized any businesses? No. Has he expanded social services? No, he’s contracted them. Has he even done the minimal of holding white collar criminals accountable for their actions that have harmed millions of Americans? No, and that’s not even a socialism issue but a rule of law issue which he came down on the side of the fascists over the good of We the People.
You brought it up. Bring some substantive proof. I’m really curious as to how he’s shared the wealth other than by subsidizing the already wealthy off the backs of the middle class and the poor.
Why don’t you quit going ad hominem on people?
It’s a rhetorical question, but valid nonetheless.
Again, you are responsible for what you reap by the nature of what you sow, nick.
You don’t like the ride? Quit buying the ticket.
that was certainly his intention, he was just too incompetent a socialist to get er done properly.
Obama’s father and mentor [in HI] were communists, isnt that share the wealth? So I doubt he is a fascist seems to me he is an incompetent socialist. Who doesnt understand fascism and socialism either.
I wasn’t chastened, merely tired. And, if you 2[two] are so concerned w/ this the forum, why don’t you stop writing epic comments about me. Hell, these are screeds about me, and I just skimmed them. Again, this is not healthy. Get out for chrissake. Take a walk. Go to a ballgame. Do some volunteer work.
“why don’t you stop writing epic comments about me.”
By “epic” of course you mean comments that extensively quote you exposing your duplicity, cowardice, vitriol and pseudo-victimhood for all to see. Those were yours words, Nick, verbatim.
DavidM: The point of a tax is to pay for the services demanded by the people. If we let you direct how the money is to be spent, we will have to charge more tax to cover those expenses because the government was not necessarily going to fund your charity, particularly if it is a religious organization or an organization that also engages in politics or for-profit projects.
Also, the point of the tax is to pay for the services demanded by the people. If we let you direct how the money is to be spent, we will have to charge MORE tax in order to cover the expenses; because the government was not necessarily going to fund the charity you want, particularly if it is a religious organization, or an organization that also engages in politics, or for-profit projects (as some charities indeed do; I know a non-profit hospital in my city has a large financial interest in a whole slew of for-profit medical offices.)
The taxes need to be enough to pay the bills, and should not be any higher. Letting you direct your tax dollars to a charity has the effect of me having to pay a larger share of the communal services available to everyone, and of you having to pay a lesser share, and using the difference to fund something that satisfies you. That is unfair, the tax money is not your money, it was never your money, it is payment for a debt you have been accumulating minute by minute earning income and now the bill is due. If you owe money for your mortgage, you don’t get to tell the bank you are paying half of it to charity so they just have to suck it up.
Bron,
Exactly how has Obama proven himself to be a “share the wealth” guy?
If you say the ACA, I’m going to laugh out loud. That’s a straight out gimme bit of corporatist corporate welfare to the health insurance industry. If you say by all he’s done to protect SS and Medicare/Medicaid, I’m also going to laugh because he’s given the GOP every cut they’ve wanted.
So please, give me an example of where Obama has been a “share the wealth” guy.
I’m really anxious to hear about it.
Even among those required to report, about 15% of charities have presidents earning over $500K, some earn millions. That isn’t a charity, it is a scam. If a charity cannot find a director willing to run the place for about $150K, it is a scam. Presumably one could find an ideologically sympathetic lawyer, former CEO, college professor, or even M.D. to run it for $150K plus the emotional satisfaction of doing the world some good. It is completely hypocritical to ask donors to dig deep and contribute to a cause while demanding to be lucratively paid to manage the operation.
So no, I would not agree. The government is composed of civil servants that earn a modest wage, it is published. There are no bonuses, or stock options, and relatively few perks (although travel and conferences are often one).
I do not believe the myth of government inefficiency, but even if I did, I prefer the government perform the services we demand, and let charity do its own thing around the edges.
DavidM: Would you be open to the idea that if he gave that $10,000 to a charity,
No, I would not. First, I am highly suspicious of any “charity” that does not have transparently open books, which is most of them.
Here is an early exposure I had to a charity: A friend of mine from college became a computer programmer (before the PC, back when small companies had mini-computers), and he got a job at a non-profit: A blood bank. Among his duties were the financial books; where he learned the blood bank collected blood for next to free, with the help of free public service ads on television and radio, with the help of volunteer nurses and technicians; it coordinated blood drives. Then it processed and sold the blood to hospitals, and the money was used to pay the two “directors” about $400K a year each, with benefits like private cars, a three week paid skiing retreat for them and their wives, parties paid for by the blood bank to thank the officers of companies that contributed. There you go, real public servants. But, it was true the blood bank was a non-profit operation.
I presume if the books aren’t open, most charities are run by sociopaths as well. Look at the Red Cross paying Elizabeth Dole six figures to be a “spokesperson” or “ambassador” or “President” or whatever her title was; I remember she had no official duties to perform for that money.
Davidm:
President Obama is definitely a member of the John Birch Society.
But since he had a share the wealth exchange with Joe the Plumber, he is to the left of center.
Can you explain how he can be a John Bircher and a share the wealth guy at the same time? This fascism/socialism stuff is so confusing.
“In my lifetime, President Obama is the most fascist of any President that I have known.”
So? I’ve said as much myself.
“Never before had I seen schools putting up pictures of the President in the classrooms like I have seen with this man.”
Except for every other President before him, capitalist tool or not.
“I never before saw school children singing songs about the sitting President.”
Irrelevant.
“Never have I seen people rise up with national pride and hope for a great change in the country that focused on the collective good of the nation.”
And never before have you seen a group of people more disappointed as when they realized the voted for a reformer and got another fascist like the four other fascists before him.
“The number of pictures of President Obama’s face popping up on walls, buttons, bumper stickers and the like quite literally reminded me of many pictures seen of Saddam Hussein around Iraq.”
Spend a lot of time in Iraq, have you?
“Yet, I consider President Obama to be left leaning, not right leaning.”
Then you aren’t paying attention.
“Would you consider President Obama to be left or right politically?”
He sold himself as left to get elected (Hitler did a similar thing), but in practice he’s center right on a good day, an extremist right wing on a bad day (such as his latest episode attacking the 1st Amendment by spying on and intimidating the press or his ultra vires assumption of the power to kill citizens without due process in violation of the Bill of Rights and the Separation of Powers Doctrine). Although I’ll stipulate he’s not as far right as Ol’ Mustache Boy, the Mad Painter. He’s not a liberal. He’s a Democrat in name but he’s not a democrat in the traditional definition of the ideology. He’s not even a competent Constitutional scholar based on his actions. He is Bush III with a darker complexion.
If you’re operating under the impression I’m some sort of Obama-bot because I’m a liberal, then you are once again operating under misconception. He lost me the day he said “We must look forward” instead of putting the traitors and war criminals from the previous administration on trial. My loyalty is to the Constitution first and foremost and Obama is anything but a friend of the Constitution. Partisan politics is a sucker’s game. I think Obama should be on the dock right next to Bush, Cheney and their cohorts in crime as an aider and abettor of treason after the fact.
Just to be clear.