Thread: France Threatens To Kick Belgium Out Of The Socialist Club

France Threatens To Kick Belgium Out Of The Socialist Club

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 12/14/2012 11:04 -0500

As more and more wealthy French bourgeousie flee (first Arnault, now Depardieu) the nation of their birth to the smaller and better-beer-making nation of Belgium, it seems that socialist president Hollande is not amused. His cunning plan to tax the crepe out of the uber-wealthy has back-fired - quelle surprise - and in the most passive aggressive statement in a while, Agence France-Presse notess that Hollande 'patriotically' demands "there's no other way" than to revise fiscal agreements with countries (cough Belgium cough) offering advantageous tax rates. AFP goes on to note his additional rantings, "We're reconciling our budget policies, we must reconcile our tax policies," Hollande said at a press conference in Brussels as France is "forced to renegotiate the tax convention to deal with those who have moved to some Belgian village." Shame really.

Via AFP (Google Translate): Depardieu: Holland wants to renegotiate tax treaties with Belgium

December 14 (AFP) - President François Hollande has Appeal in Brussels on Friday, a "ethical behavior" of each, and has called for a renegotiation of tax treaties with Belgium, about exile tax actor Gerard Depardieu.

"Everyone must be ethical, regardless the business that, "said the head of the French state, interviewed during a press conference after the summit Europe.

He felt that there was "no other way to do" that "review (the) tax treaties" with countries offer tax advantages. France would thus he said, "have to renegotiate the tax treaty (with Belgium) to treat the case of those who settled in a Belgian village. "

"They are suspicious, it's a socialist mayor," he quipped Mr. Holland, in an allusion to the village where Néchin Gérard Depardieu acquired a property, as before him other wealthy French.

"We align our fiscal policy, we harmonize our tax policies, "he said.

Castigating the "dumpings tax" charged by some European countries with respect to companies or individuals, it warned that it was "not in favor of procedures amnesty "tax.

The departure of Gérard Depardieu for Belgium is "quite pathetic, "said Wednesday the Prime Minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault.

Néchin village, distant only a mile the French border and the town of Roubaix (Nord), in 27% of French residents, often very wealthy, including members Mulliez family, which controls the distribution group Auchan.

Belgium offers special conditions advantageous for large fortunes French: there is not tax on capital, or capital gains tax and inheritance are cheaper than in France.

France Threatens To Kick Belgium Out Of The Socialist Club | ZeroHedge

http://www.alipac.us/f19/socialists-...6/#post1318392

Depardieu 'Shrugged'

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 12/16/2012 16:31 -0500

• Belgium
• France
• headlines

Via Emmanuel Martin, Executive Director of the Institute for Economic Studies-Europe (www.ies-europe.org) and editor of www.LibreAfrique.org.,

Last week the big story in French headlines has been the tax exile of Gerard Depardieu in Nechin, Belgium, half a mile from the French border. French PM Jean-Marc Ayrault called the French movie star’s behavior “minable” (pathetic). A socialist MP, Yann Galut, even suggested that M. Depardieu loses his French nationality. In an open letter in the Journal Du Dimanche on December 16, Depardieu, who famously starred as Obélix, the big Gallic fellow of Astérix, carrying menhirs on his back – and sometimes throwing them at the Romans, replies. With a taste of Ayn Rand’s famous character John Galt.

Gerard shrugged.

Depardieu begins by saying that what is pathetic is to call his behavior pathetic.

Although he does not want to justify the many reasons of his choice, he makes it clear that he leaves after paying 85% of taxes on his income this year and € 145 million through his entire life; He leaves because the French PM thinks that “success, creation and talent, in fact difference, must be punished”. He then reminds Jean-Marc Ayrault that he set up companies that employ 80 people. Depardieu says he is ready to give up his French passport and his “Social Security” (the French public health care system, which he claims he never used).

This letter is important.

First because thanks to a top actor, the categories of incentives and unintended (though highly expectable) consequences will probably enter the “consciousness area” of a statist French political class (right and left alike).

Imposing a 75% income tax above €1 million does have consequences on the incentives of the rich and creative people.

Mr Hollande and his team might call it “just” because, as the French President once famously said, he doesn’t “like the rich”, the fact is that one does not promote economic progress by hitting the creative and successful minds.

Those are obsolete collectivist policies based on envy and scapegoating: they are only effective at creating division and killing the goose with the golden egg, that is, generate more poverty. Not exactly “just” in the end.

Second because Depardieu stresses the fact that he is a European, a “citizen of the World”, and remains a “free man”.

He is effectively saying that thanks to globalization we are free to escape a government’s crushing fist.

Institutional competition, and especially tax competition is an essential feature of our liberty: it is crucial that people can “vote with their feet”. Of course European politicians, French ones especially, are too eager to suppress this liberty – again in the name of justice, harmonization, equality, solidarity and what have you. What that story also tells us is that should Europe become a “giant France”, it would be doomed. Unfortunately, recent efforts in the direction of more EU centralization do not carry optimism.

Now, to be completely fair on that “Depardieu shrugging”, the tiny issue is that state subsidies to the film industry in France probably indirectly helped the man to become famous and rich, even if overall he probably paid a lot more that he received, and in the end owed much to his personal talent.

Not a pure John Galt then. But a good start.

Open Letter to French PM Jean-Marc Ayrault (from Gerard Depardieu):

You say "pathetic"? As it is pathetic.

I was born in 1948, I started working at the age of 14 years as a printer, then as a warehouseman as dramatic artist. I always paid my taxes regardless of the rate under all governments.

At no time, I have failed in my duties. Historical films I participated reflect my love of France and its history.

Most illustrious characters that were expatriates me or left the country.

I unfortunately have nothing more to do here, but I continue to love the French public and with whom I shared so many emotions, I'm leaving because you consider that success, creativity, talent, actually The difference must be punished.

I do not ask to be approved, I could at least be respected.

All those who left France were not insulted as I am.

I do not have to justify the reasons for my choice, which are numerous and intimate.

I leave after paying, in 2012, 85% tax on my income. But I keep in mind that France was beautiful and I hope will remain.

I give you my passport and Social Security, which I've never used. We no longer the same country, I'm a true European, a citizen of the world, as my father has always taught.

I find pathetic the hard justice against my son William judged by judges who condemned any kid to three years in prison for two grams of heroin, when so many others escaped prison for acts otherwise more serious.

I do not blame all those cholesterol, hypertension, diabetes, or too much alcohol or those who sleep on their scooter: I'm one of them as your expensive media like both the repeat.

I never killed anybody, I do not think unworthy, I paid 145 million tax in forty-five years, I have 80 people working in companies that were created for them and which are managed by them.

I am not to complain or to brag, but I refuse the word "pathetic".

Who are you to judge me so I ask you Mr. Ayrault, Prime Minister Mr. Holland, I ask you, who are you? Despite my excesses, my appetite and my love life, I am a free being, sir, and I'll be polite.

Gérard Depardieu

Depardieu 'Shrugged' | ZeroHedge

“Trench Warfare” And “Civil War” Over Confiscatory Taxes In France

Submitted by testosteronepit on 12/23/2012 18:34 -0500

Wolf Richter www.testosteronepit.com www.amazon.com/author/wolfrichter

“We’re engaging in trench warfare,” proclaimed Alain Afflelou, head honcho and founder of an eyewear company with 1,200 stores in France and other countries. One of the wealthiest men in France. He was talking about the tax fiasco that split France in two. He was done with his country. He’s moving to London. One of France’s so-called fiscal exiles.

He’d set up his international headquarters in Switzerland, rather than France, 15 years ago to minimize his company’s tax burden, but now he’d personally bail out.

The clamor had started in September when it leaked out that Bernard Arnault, richest man in France and CEO of luxury-goods empires LVMH and Groupe Arnault, was applying for Belgian citizenship. In response, Economy Minister Pierre Moscovici threatened to renegotiate the tax treaties with Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland. A few days ago, reports surfaced in the Belgian media that mailbox companies—a dozen at the Brussels apartment of a Groupe Arnault director alone—have allowed Arnault’s empire to escape several hundred million euros in taxes.

Belgium got cold feet. On Saturday before Christmas when nothing was supposed to happen, Anti-Fraud Secretary of State John Crombez requested that Finance Minister Steven Vanackere transfer Arnault’s tax file to the tax authorities in France, an idea the minister did not immediately reject.

Now Arnault got cold feet. LVMH and Groupe Arnault defended themselves the best they could, claiming that these mailbox companies had “economically perfectly real activities in Belgium where some of them have been implanted for decades.” Indeed, they were “surprised” by the allegations.

But no one stirred up the heat in France like iconic actor Gérard Depardieu who, turns out, set up his domicile in Néchin, a village just across the border in Belgium—as the mayor confirmed, “to escape French taxation.”

Final straw for President Hollande. Now he too threatened to renegotiate the tax treaty “to deal with cases of those who settle in some Belgian village.” He lashed out against the “fiscal dumping” that some countries in the EU were practicing. Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault chimed in; Depardieu’s exile was “pretty pathetic.”

Depardieu was not amused. In an open letter, he renounced his French citizenship, broadsided the Prime Minister and the President, and shocked the nation: all taxes combined ate up 85% of his income.

Not true, explained eyewear mega-retailer Alain Afflelou during the interview. “Those who are in the 75% income-tax bracket may go well beyond 90% taxation.” He listed layers of additional taxes, small percentages here and there that added up. “We therefore have in France a confiscatory taxation that can deprive us of all of our income from work.”

Then he uttered “trench warfare” to describe the battle between the two sides. “We have to stop saying that CEOs are thieves, thugs, and dishonest people. We need people who work, who make a living, who create jobs.”

He was echoing Laurence Parisot, President of the MEDEF, France’s largest employer union. “Doubt is taking over the life force of the country,” she complained; Hollande in his confrontation with Depardieu was doing “the opposite of what he promised,” namely to pacify the country and reduce antagonism. “We are in the process of creating a climate of civil war, similar to 1789,” she said.

Hollande jumped on the airwaves and tried to impose some sort of armistice. The 75% tax bracket would be temporary, he said. And concerning Depardieu: “No citizen must be stigmatized by the President.” But by using that word, he stigmatized him—and all the others who’re trying to escape.

There are a lot of them. Le Figaro cited tax lawyers who spoke of “unprecedented waves” of fiscal exiles who were leaving France, some of them in the middle of the school year, which “had never happened before.” Moving companies confirmed it. Outflows “remain two to three times higher than normal,” said the boss of one of them. “Our trucks leave constantly in direction of Switzerland, Belgium, and Great Britain.”

And the profile of the fiscal exiles has changed. They’re no longer rich heirs or fifty-year-olds who’d sold their companies, but “young childless entrepreneurs” who wanted “to settle in another country to start up their companies,” according to one of the tax lawyers. And top executives between 40 and 55 were moving with their kids to Brussels or London “to escape” the new taxes.

Entire skill sets were leaving. International companies were “progressively relocating part of their teams abroad,” said le Figaro’s source within the MEDEF. Among them more and more secondary functions, such as human resources or finance—”much less visible and symbolic than relocating headquarters.”

With heavy consequences for the economy. When talent, entrepreneurial energy, capital, and profits leave the country all at the same time, it’s hard to imagine how economic growth and job creation could miraculously reappear.

Also on Friday before Christmas when nobody was supposed to pay attention, the European Commission issued a mind-boggling report on bank bailouts in the EU: Member States had committed over $2 trillion at the expense of current and future taxpayers to bail out stockholders, bondholders, and speculators.

Read.... The EU Bailout Oligarchy Issues A Report About Itself.


“Trench Warfare� And “Civil War� Over Confiscatory Taxes In France | ZeroHedge

“Trench Warfare” And “Civil War” Over Confiscatory Taxes In France

Submitted by testosteronepit on 12/23/2012 18:34 -0500

Wolf Richter www.testosteronepit.com www.amazon.com/author/wolfrichter

“We’re engaging in trench warfare,” proclaimed Alain Afflelou, head honcho and founder of an eyewear company with 1,200 stores in France and other countries. One of the wealthiest men in France. He was talking about the tax fiasco that split France in two. He was done with his country. He’s moving to London. One of France’s so-called fiscal exiles.

He’d set up his international headquarters in Switzerland, rather than France, 15 years ago to minimize his company’s tax burden, but now he’d personally bail out.

The clamor had started in September when it leaked out that Bernard Arnault, richest man in France and CEO of luxury-goods empires LVMH and Groupe Arnault, was applying for Belgian citizenship. In response, Economy Minister Pierre Moscovici threatened to renegotiate the tax treaties with Belgium, Luxembourg, and Switzerland. A few days ago, reports surfaced in the Belgian media that mailbox companies—a dozen at the Brussels apartment of a Groupe Arnault director alone—have allowed Arnault’s empire to escape several hundred million euros in taxes.

Belgium got cold feet. On Saturday before Christmas when nothing was supposed to happen, Anti-Fraud Secretary of State John Crombez requested that Finance Minister Steven Vanackere transfer Arnault’s tax file to the tax authorities in France, an idea the minister did not immediately reject.

Now Arnault got cold feet. LVMH and Groupe Arnault defended themselves the best they could, claiming that these mailbox companies had “economically perfectly real activities in Belgium where some of them have been implanted for decades.” Indeed, they were “surprised” by the allegations.

But no one stirred up the heat in France like iconic actor Gérard Depardieu who, turns out, set up his domicile in Néchin, a village just across the border in Belgium—as the mayor confirmed, “to escape French taxation.”

Final straw for President Hollande. Now he too threatened to renegotiate the tax treaty “to deal with cases of those who settle in some Belgian village.” He lashed out against the “fiscal dumping” that some countries in the EU were practicing. Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault chimed in; Depardieu’s exile was “pretty pathetic.”

Depardieu was not amused. In an open letter, he renounced his French citizenship, broadsided the Prime Minister and the President, and shocked the nation: all taxes combined ate up 85% of his income.

Not true, explained eyewear mega-retailer Alain Afflelou during the interview. “Those who are in the 75% income-tax bracket may go well beyond 90% taxation.” He listed layers of additional taxes, small percentages here and there that added up. “We therefore have in France a confiscatory taxation that can deprive us of all of our income from work.”

Then he uttered “trench warfare” to describe the battle between the two sides. “We have to stop saying that CEOs are thieves, thugs, and dishonest people. We need people who work, who make a living, who create jobs.”

He was echoing Laurence Parisot, President of the MEDEF, France’s largest employer union. “Doubt is taking over the life force of the country,” she complained; Hollande in his confrontation with Depardieu was doing “the opposite of what he promised,” namely to pacify the country and reduce antagonism. “We are in the process of creating a climate of civil war, similar to 1789,” she said.

Hollande jumped on the airwaves and tried to impose some sort of armistice. The 75% tax bracket would be temporary, he said. And concerning Depardieu: “No citizen must be stigmatized by the President.” But by using that word, he stigmatized him—and all the others who’re trying to escape.

There are a lot of them. Le Figaro cited tax lawyers who spoke of “unprecedented waves” of fiscal exiles who were leaving France, some of them in the middle of the school year, which “had never happened before.” Moving companies confirmed it. Outflows “remain two to three times higher than normal,” said the boss of one of them. “Our trucks leave constantly in direction of Switzerland, Belgium, and Great Britain.”

And the profile of the fiscal exiles has changed. They’re no longer rich heirs or fifty-year-olds who’d sold their companies, but “young childless entrepreneurs” who wanted “to settle in another country to start up their companies,” according to one of the tax lawyers. And top executives between 40 and 55 were moving with their kids to Brussels or London “to escape” the new taxes.

Entire skill sets were leaving. International companies were “progressively relocating part of their teams abroad,” said le Figaro’s source within the MEDEF. Among them more and more secondary functions, such as human resources or finance—”much less visible and symbolic than relocating headquarters.”

With heavy consequences for the economy. When talent, entrepreneurial energy, capital, and profits leave the country all at the same time, it’s hard to imagine how economic growth and job creation could miraculously reappear.

Also on Friday before Christmas when nobody was supposed to pay attention, the European Commission issued a mind-boggling report on bank bailouts in the EU: Member States had committed over $2 trillion at the expense of current and future taxpayers to bail out stockholders, bondholders, and speculators.

Read.... The EU Bailout Oligarchy Issues A Report About Itself.


“Trench Warfare� And “Civil War� Over Confiscatory Taxes In France | ZeroHedge