Rich French people look to EU capital Brussels to avoid new French tax on rich
Marc Goldbrenner, a top salesman at Lecobel, a real estate agent in the Belgian and EU capital, says he has meetings two or three times a week with French "fiscal exiles" who want to avoid President Francois Hollande's new rich tax.
"They are industrialists, company owners, independent people with large inheritances ... They like the ambiance here. People walk around. There are nice cafes. They want a life a bit like in Paris," Goldbrenner told EUobserver on Wednesday (26 September).
But many people do not believe him - four days after the news broke, thousands of Belgian trade unionists marched close by to his apartment in 5 Avenue d'Hougoumont in the Uccle district shouting into megaphones about "tax justice." Member states have not given EU officials the power to set national tax rates. But pro-tax-harmonisation hawks say that unless they take the step, tax tourism will spoil national efforts to balance the books.
Details of the French tax - including a promised 75 percent on incomes of €1 million a year or more - are to be unveiled in Paris on Friday... The top tax band for Belgian residents is 50 percent. ... But people expect more to come as Hollande's tax bites.
http://euobserver.com/economic/117684
Europe must be a republican nightmare. It is hard for them to imagine how bad things are there for rich people when they are fleeing towards a 50% income tax rate haven. I doubt many of our republicans look at a 50% tax rate as a haven but as a 'socialist' hell.
