France targets deficit cut with tax-hiking budget

[dipsydoodle]

Source: Reuters

(Reuters) - President Francois Hollande's Socialist government unveiled sharp tax hikes on business and the rich on Friday in a 2013 budget aimed at showing France has the fiscal rigour to remain at the core of the euro zone.

The package will recoup 30 billion euros (24 billion pounds) for the public purse with a goal of narrowing the deficit to 3.0 percent of national output next year from 4.5 percent this year - France's toughest single belt-tightening in 30 years.

But with record unemployment and a barrage of data pointing to economic stagnation, there are fears the deficit target will slip as France falls short of the modest 0.8 percent economic growth rate on which it is banking for next year.

The budget will also disappoint pro-reform lobbyists by merely freezing France's high public spending rather than daring to attack ministerial budgets as Spain did this week in a bid to avoid the conditions of an international bailout.

Read more: http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/09/28/uk-france-budget-idUKBRE88R0AI20120928

[liberal N proud]

1. They obviously don't know how it is supposed to work

You give the rich a tax cut!

[dipsydoodle]

2. The issue in France will become

the rich and corporations skirting liabilities - won't take them long to figure how to do that. The corporations will probably simply register associated companies in Luxembourg if they've not already done so - that's how the UK came partly unstuck.

The overall problem there is one of assuming "budget figures" to be real and they're not - just a projection. He's already come unstuck on the current situation with their car manufacturers which has necessitated him breaking election promises somewhat.

[rachel1]

3. Hats of to Hollande