75% tax disappears after reporting 400 million euros – L’Express

75% tax disappears after reporting 400 million euros – L'Express

France is preparing to quietly bury a symbolic measure of the beginnings of the presidency of François Hollande, the “tax to 75%” on very high incomes. A symbolic measure that has generated more controversy reported money to state coffers 400 million euros in two years, an amount almost trivial compared with the billions deficit of France.

Promised by François Hollande during his campaign in 2012, supported by public opinion, watered down after his election, this “exceptional solidarity contribution” will disappear to 1 February. It was planned from the start to target the remuneration of only 2013 and 2014.

One of the great controversies of the quinquennium

In France taxation among the highest in Europe, no tax has spilled much ink since the 80s and the introduction by another socialist president, François Mitterrand, the wealth tax, never questioned since.

The controversy was ignited in the fall of 2012 after the announcement that billionaire Bernard Arnault, the first capital of France and head of the world’s biggest luxury group LVMH had “sought dual citizenship Franco belgian “. In December, the actor Gérard Depardieu, one of the most famous French artists in the world, slammed the door, accusing the French tax authorities to charge him 85% of its revenues and seeking Russian citizenship.

Emmanuel Macron, a symbol of the new line

retoquée end of 2012 by the Constitutional Council, which had pointed to the threat of a levy “confiscatory” tax was finally endorsed in December 2013 a revised version, paid by companies on the share of income of their employees exceeding one million euros, with a ceiling of 5% of turnover.

Among the fiercest opponents, professional football clubs in Ligue 1 and 2 have fought against it until the end, even brandishing the fall of 2013 the threat of a strike matches. The initiative was cut short, failing to rally public sympathy for the cause of multi-millionaires large training stars like Paris Saint-Germain, a dozen players were involved in the collection.

The non-extension coincides with the Reform turn taken last year by François Hollande, with a policy aimed at easing burdens on businesses to boost investment and employment. Symbol of this shift, Emmanuel Macron, promoted late August Economy Minister, had himself lampooned in 2012 the tax to 75% claiming that it constituted “Cuba without the sun.”