5 ms·

> I do wonder what the French population actually want as a solution to the unsustainable debt and huge proportion of tax revenue(second highest in the EU) spen

> I do wonder what the French population actually want as a solution to the unsustainable debt and huge proportion of tax revenue(second highest in the EU) spent on social benefits. Fewer rich people would be my guess.

logicchains 1y ago
Total French private wealth is around $15 trillion (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_private_wealth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_pri... ), French government spending is around $1.8 trillion/year. Even if the French government were to tax 100% of that wealth, it wouldn't be enough to cover 10 years of spending. Fundamentally the French economy isn't producing enough to support the current level of pension spending, due to a continuously falling ratio of workers to retirees. No amount of taxing anyone could produce enough money to plug that hole.
- aurareturn 1y ago
  Fundamentally the French economy isn't producing enough to support the current level of pension spending, due to a continuously falling ratio of workers to retirees. Do we think this is why French government added so many immigrants in recent times? Of course an influx of immigrants will cause other issues. But if wealthy people need more population to keep their wealth up, I don't think they care.
  - alephnerd 1y ago
    It's not about wealthy people alone. You need staff to clean retirees sh!t (literally) in a country where the median age is 42.3 and rising. France overspent in the 2000s and 2010s due to populist politics, and now the chickens have come to roost. Something needs to give in France, otherwise it'll become an Italy 2.0.
  - vladvasiliu 1y ago
    > Do we think this is why French government added so many immigrants in recent times? It's part of the official discourse.
- vdupras 1y ago
  10 years of covering 100% of spending? That sounds like a really sweet deal to me, and more than enough to invest into the nation enough to go back to a balanced budget in that time frame. I mean, try it with yourself. Imagine that you take your current salary, keep it for 10 years, and have 100% of your spending covered? How life changing would that be to you? Probably a lot.
  - returningfory2 1y ago
    What happens on year 11?
  - zdragnar 1y ago
    ...for 10 years. After that, you're back in the hole that you were in before, but without anything to draw on. They're currently taking in the equivalent of $500 billion but spending $1.8 trillion, with a GDP of $3 trillion. Understand that the non-wealthy wouldn't get anything new, it would just be a continuance of their current services and benefits. They've have 10 years to increase their GDP by 50% to get the tax revenue to get to a balanced budget. That's simply not happening without obscene inflation, with the corresponding increase in government spending on goods and services, keeping them out of whack.
  - creer 1y ago
    Who do you propose to sell all that stuff to?
- triceratops 1y ago
  This is simplistic nonsense regularly blurted out by opponents of wealth taxes. It supposes that assets are converted by some alchemy into pallets of cash. The government then piles the pallets up into a big vault and feeds them into a furnace every year until it runs out. And then it's all gone forever. That's not how things work. Seriously think through what implementing this would look like. Go through the steps at a high level instead of just adding up 3 numbers and declaring it will never work. I don't think any government should take over all private wealth. It would be a gross human rights violation and an economic disaster. But this argument against it severely lacks logic and rigor.
  - triceratops 1y ago
    Downvoters: You're proving my point by refusing to engage with logic.
CamperBob2 1y ago
When has that ever helped?
- throwaway894345 1y ago
  Seems to be working pretty well in the Scandinavian countries.
  - FirmwareBurner 1y ago
    They have A LOT of rich people. The thing is people don't care about how many rich people there are out there, as long as they can get a good life out of their labor (good job, good house, etc) but since capitalism has optimized these out of the reach for most people nowadays, then they start to blame rich people for everything, with the definition of the word 'rich' here being very fluid, ending up to mean just about everyone who has more than they do, and not just your Bezos, Musk and Saudi kings, so any taxes on the "rich" ends up only on the hard working middle class again.
  - rsynnott 1y ago
    Interestingly, while Denmark has very low wealth inequality, Norway's is only middling, and Sweden's is the highest in Europe, in the same range as the US, Brazil and Russia. The Scandinavian countries have very low _income_ inequality (post-transfers). Income equality is probably more important than wealth equality in terms of quality of life, but wealth inequality isn't nothing. (Also you have to be a bit careful with wealth inequality figures, as they can be distorted by local practices; for instance in some countries where defined benefit pensions are standard, such a pension, even though clearly valuable, may not be assessed as wealth, and in some countries it may be common to have a long-term/effectively life right to a fixed-cost rental, which again, is wealth-like, but probably not assessed as wealth.)
  - spwa4 1y ago
    You mean the ones who are selling so much oil they put a lot of it in a sovereign wealth fund? Sure. I think the real question is how to make it work without oil money coming in. Without the constant extra help from foreign countries that money buys. France has some, but not much. Certainly not enough to cover all state expenses and have left over.

logicchains 1y ago

Total French private wealth is around $15 trillion (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_private_wealth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_total_pri... ), French government spending is around $1.8 trillion/year. Even if the French government were to tax 100% of that wealth, it wouldn't be enough to cover 10 years of spending. Fundamentally the French economy isn't producing enough to support the current level of pension spending, due to a continuously falling ratio of workers to retirees. No amount of taxing anyone could produce enough money to plug that hole.

aurareturn 1y ago
Fundamentally the French economy isn't producing enough to support the current level of pension spending, due to a continuously falling ratio of workers to retirees. Do we think this is why French government added so many immigrants in recent times? Of course an influx of immigrants will cause other issues. But if wealthy people need more population to keep their wealth up, I don't think they care.
- alephnerd 1y ago
  It's not about wealthy people alone. You need staff to clean retirees sh!t (literally) in a country where the median age is 42.3 and rising. France overspent in the 2000s and 2010s due to populist politics, and now the chickens have come to roost. Something needs to give in France, otherwise it'll become an Italy 2.0.
- vladvasiliu 1y ago
  > Do we think this is why French government added so many immigrants in recent times? It's part of the official discourse.
vdupras 1y ago
10 years of covering 100% of spending? That sounds like a really sweet deal to me, and more than enough to invest into the nation enough to go back to a balanced budget in that time frame. I mean, try it with yourself. Imagine that you take your current salary, keep it for 10 years, and have 100% of your spending covered? How life changing would that be to you? Probably a lot.
- returningfory2 1y ago
  What happens on year 11?
- zdragnar 1y ago
  ...for 10 years. After that, you're back in the hole that you were in before, but without anything to draw on. They're currently taking in the equivalent of $500 billion but spending $1.8 trillion, with a GDP of $3 trillion. Understand that the non-wealthy wouldn't get anything new, it would just be a continuance of their current services and benefits. They've have 10 years to increase their GDP by 50% to get the tax revenue to get to a balanced budget. That's simply not happening without obscene inflation, with the corresponding increase in government spending on goods and services, keeping them out of whack.
- creer 1y ago
  Who do you propose to sell all that stuff to?
triceratops 1y ago
This is simplistic nonsense regularly blurted out by opponents of wealth taxes. It supposes that assets are converted by some alchemy into pallets of cash. The government then piles the pallets up into a big vault and feeds them into a furnace every year until it runs out. And then it's all gone forever. That's not how things work. Seriously think through what implementing this would look like. Go through the steps at a high level instead of just adding up 3 numbers and declaring it will never work. I don't think any government should take over all private wealth. It would be a gross human rights violation and an economic disaster. But this argument against it severely lacks logic and rigor.
- triceratops 1y ago
  Downvoters: You're proving my point by refusing to engage with logic.

CamperBob2 1y ago

When has that ever helped?

throwaway894345 1y ago
Seems to be working pretty well in the Scandinavian countries.
- FirmwareBurner 1y ago
  They have A LOT of rich people. The thing is people don't care about how many rich people there are out there, as long as they can get a good life out of their labor (good job, good house, etc) but since capitalism has optimized these out of the reach for most people nowadays, then they start to blame rich people for everything, with the definition of the word 'rich' here being very fluid, ending up to mean just about everyone who has more than they do, and not just your Bezos, Musk and Saudi kings, so any taxes on the "rich" ends up only on the hard working middle class again.
- rsynnott 1y ago
  Interestingly, while Denmark has very low wealth inequality, Norway's is only middling, and Sweden's is the highest in Europe, in the same range as the US, Brazil and Russia. The Scandinavian countries have very low _income_ inequality (post-transfers). Income equality is probably more important than wealth equality in terms of quality of life, but wealth inequality isn't nothing. (Also you have to be a bit careful with wealth inequality figures, as they can be distorted by local practices; for instance in some countries where defined benefit pensions are standard, such a pension, even though clearly valuable, may not be assessed as wealth, and in some countries it may be common to have a long-term/effectively life right to a fixed-cost rental, which again, is wealth-like, but probably not assessed as wealth.)
- spwa4 1y ago
  You mean the ones who are selling so much oil they put a lot of it in a sovereign wealth fund? Sure. I think the real question is how to make it work without oil money coming in. Without the constant extra help from foreign countries that money buys. France has some, but not much. Certainly not enough to cover all state expenses and have left over.