Rich Businessmen Pulling Out of France as Tax-Hit Looms

[MachineGhost]

"It's nearly a general panic. Some 400 to 500 residences worth more than one million euros ($1.3 million) have come onto the Paris market," said managers at Daniel Feau, a real-estate broker that specialises in high-end property.

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While the Socialists' plan to raise the tax rate to 75 percent on income above 1.0 million euros per year has generated the most headlines, a sharp increase in taxes on capital gains from the sales of stock and company stakes is pushing most people to leave, according Didier Bugeon, head of the wealth manager Equance.

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Daniel Feau agreed that the profile of those who are leaving has changed, from the idle rich to "managers of major international corporations, entrepreneurs and investors much younger than previously who are scared of the marginal tax rate of 62.21 percent on sales of stock."

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He told the daily Le Parisien that debate on the 75-percent income tax bracket was "closed" but noted that it was only a temporary tax for two years.


http://www.france24.com/en/20121007-ric ... -hit-looms

[Ad Orientem]

Europe is discovering what many left leaning states in the US have found out the hard way. If you raise taxes above a certain threshold the more productive elements in society will revolt and "vote with their feet." With European integration, immigration between varying EU states is not nearly as complicated as it used to be.