The narrow streets around the Rue de Grenelle in Paris, a short
stroll from the Boulevard St Germain, are dotted with familiar
waystations of the internationally monied. There are smart restaurants,
art galleries and designer clothes shops, among them Moschino and Dolce
& Gabbana.
Above and between these places are townhouses and mansion apartments with grilled gates or with smoked-glass doors guarding the entrances – foyers hushed to the kind of silence that only serious money can buy. How serious the money is can be confirmed by a scan of the property pages online – in one case, almost €2m for a two-bedroom flat with three bathrooms.
It is in districts such as this, around Avenue Mozart and in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France's wealthiest postcode, that a cold wind has suddenly begun to blow, prompted by the announcement by François Hollande, France's Socialist president, that he intends to make good on his threat from February and soak les riches. That, we now know, will take the form of a two-year emergency tax of 75% on individuals earning more than €1.1m (£900,000) a year as part of his government's efforts to fill a €30bn hole in the public finances.
Even before Hollande delivered his announcement, he was pre-empted by the very public confirmation by France's wealthiest man, Bernard Arnault, head of the luxury goods firm LVMH, that he planned to apply to Belgium for dual nationality. The remarks were calculated to cause political impact, although Arnault later attempted to insist that he had no intention of ducking his French taxes.
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/15/paris-dispatch-tax-traitors
Above and between these places are townhouses and mansion apartments with grilled gates or with smoked-glass doors guarding the entrances – foyers hushed to the kind of silence that only serious money can buy. How serious the money is can be confirmed by a scan of the property pages online – in one case, almost €2m for a two-bedroom flat with three bathrooms.
It is in districts such as this, around Avenue Mozart and in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France's wealthiest postcode, that a cold wind has suddenly begun to blow, prompted by the announcement by François Hollande, France's Socialist president, that he intends to make good on his threat from February and soak les riches. That, we now know, will take the form of a two-year emergency tax of 75% on individuals earning more than €1.1m (£900,000) a year as part of his government's efforts to fill a €30bn hole in the public finances.
Even before Hollande delivered his announcement, he was pre-empted by the very public confirmation by France's wealthiest man, Bernard Arnault, head of the luxury goods firm LVMH, that he planned to apply to Belgium for dual nationality. The remarks were calculated to cause political impact, although Arnault later attempted to insist that he had no intention of ducking his French taxes.
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/15/paris-dispatch-tax-traitors
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