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Comment by carlob | Hacker News Reader

Regarding the soundbite in the article on the 60% tax rate: I find it extremely misleading, bordering on bad faith.

1. The baseline is not the money made selling, but the capital _gain_, that is income, not revenue.

2. Keeping those 15% social charges into account negates the fact that those will accrue your retirement, invalidity, unemployment, what-have-you fund

3. France has a 35 hour workweek. Companies who ask their employees to work longer than that without compensating them in extra days of holiday are breaking the law. So much for the quoted 70 hour workweek.

4. The 10 years of uncertainty are not so uncertain in a country with such a strong welfare state: in case of failure you would have several months of unemployment checks which have a very high cap (as demonstrated by a recent scandal with soccer players).

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In response to the social taxes, all taxes are like this; they end up in a pool that (hopefully) provides services to the taxpayers.

In the case of significant capital gains, the taxpayer is unlikely to be a welfare recipient, and is paying into the system without benefit.

I have no problem with this; it's the nature of taxation. But lumping it in with general taxation is not misleading at all.

If it were a superannuation scheme, and you got the money back when you retired, you might have a point - but it's not.

I don't agree. Taxes are not the same thing as social charges, here's why.

If you make 250k a year, you pay a lot in social charges, but not as much in percentage (usually retirement charges are regressive) and in exchange you get unemployment checks and retirement that are proportional to how much you've put in. In short you get back what you've put in.

On the other hand income taxes are usually progressive (the richer you are the larger the percentage you pay) and richer people benefit less from them, in that they go to finance public transportation, education and hospital which rich people tend to use as much if not less than commoners.

Except your lifetime worth of contributions is one policy shift away from becoming worthless. Unlike a superannuation scheme, paying into it now guarantees you nothing in the future.

Nobody making moderate capital gains would pay these charges voluntarily, in exchange for benefits it gives them. Thus it makes complete sense to lump it in with the other capital gains taxes when discussing incentives.

From Wikipedia:

"The mandatory state pension is an unfunded contributory penison based on redistribution of contributions from those working to those in retirement. The scheme aims to provide up to a maximum of 50% of the retirees highest earning years up to a limit of 35,000€ annually (in 2010)."

> Nobody making moderate capital gains would pay these charges voluntarily, in exchange for benefits it gives them.

Almost nobody who pays taxes would pay them voluntarily, especially the rich who get no benefits from paying them. Yet we force them to, it's the redistributive nature of taxes.

Phew - some "straw men" there don't you think?

It is the entrepreneurs who do the 70 hour weeks (no 35 hour limits for the boss/owner).

Start a company with €100 and grow it to be worth €500,000 on exit - that is an almost total capital gain (if you get to put something in a pension fund at the same time then you would be very lucky).

And all the while paying the very high social charges that accrue in France

Well you don't need to put money in a pension fund if you pay social charges.

Wrong: the state funds/agencies themselves recommend and propose extra (non obligatory) pension funds on top of obligatory social charges because, as they warn every French working, return on social charges is forecasted to steadily decreases over the years. (Aging population: less people working to pay for more retirees)

It says "60% Capital Gains tax - the real innovation killer" in a big bold font. We're talking about startups in France here. You can be in 3 other (more tax-friendly) country's in a few hours drive. Also founders are not employees. You can easily work 70 hours (and still fail, that's why people looking to sell their company will hate the 60% capital gains tax). And again: As founders are not employees they do not receive the same benefits when they fail / get sick / whatnot.

Yes they do if they pay their social charges.

Ah, I stand corrected. So as a founder in France you can receive money from the government when you're sick or if your business tanks? (Most start ups do). Didn't know that. In most other European country's you need to arrange your own thing (via an insurance).

Wrong. eg. If company fails, employees get several month salaries from the State (ok) but founder (ownership >50%) while he paid social charges will receive 0. You'd have to get your own (expensive) private insurance if the biz does not work out to get something back.

This sounds more like how it would be (and how it is in the Netherlands).

The 35 hour workweek is not as simple as "only working 35 hours". It is the case for blue-collar workers (ouvriers) but things are less rigid for white-collar workers and management (cadres).

"Ouvriers" are paid by the hour and "Cadres" per day. All engineers working in IT should have a "cadre" contract, so they do not really count their hours.

Boss or staff, in the French startups with whom I did have the pleasure to work, the 35 hours are far away from the really worked hours.

I know engineers who get up to 8 weeks of paid holiday because they accrue JRTT (days of reduction of work time) when they work overtime.

Regarding your points 3 and 4, he is talking about founders, not regular employees.

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