Multiple parties are jockeying for position in the aftermath of France’s seismic snap election. The leftist New Popular Front (NPF) insists its ideas should be implemented.
France’s left wing New Popular Front (NPF) - now the largest group in parliament - has called for a prime minister who will implement its ideas including a new wealth tax and petrol price controls.
The leftist alliance secured the most seats in the recent French elections but fell short of the 289 needed for a majority in the National Assembly, France’s lower house of parliament.
President Emmanuel Macron’s Together bloc came in second and Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally (RN) party finished third.
France’s parties are now jockeying for position and it’s unclear exactly how things will shake out, but the NPF has insisted it will implement its radical set of ideas.
The problem with high wealth taxes is the same as the problem with nationalizing privately-owned businesses. Even if you’re not worried about the people you tax fleeing the country (maybe they can’t because their investments aren’t mobile) you still have to worry about the fact that no one would build anything in France (even things not currently taxed) if there was good reason to think that France might suddenly decide to seize a large fraction of its value.
(High income taxes aren’t as big a deal because wealthy people can restructure their investments in order to avoid most of them, but I wonder whether the lost economic activity is actually worth more to the country than the money raised by the tax.)