Replies

“Class warfare, tax the rich. That is the class warfare crap that usually comes out of Democrats, not Conservatives.”

No class warfare whatever.
Taxes have to be raised. What is the fairest way to raise them? By having a flat tax that hits everybody the same. But ah, that’s the rub. The same HOW? Somebody who has inherited a large estate but has a decent professionals income, and his colleague who was not born into wealth - both do the same job, both earn the same wealth each year, and both are taxed the same on earnings. However, they do not live anything like the same lives! For the one, through blind fortune, lives like a prince. The other would like to, but the high rate of taxation on both of their salaries holds back the one from every catching up with the blind heredity lottery of the other. Now, some say that this should be settled by a heavy inheritance tax. Absent anything else, that’s true, but that’s not really fair either. Gaining an inheritance through luck of the genetic draw is no different from winning a lottery, except that the two are taxed very differently. And then there is the matter of capital gains and dividends, realized and unrealized. They are certainly accretions to wealth and power, and yet they are not taxed the same. So, we end up with a strange system in which labor, which is the very hardest way to earn money, is ALSO the way that is most brutally punished by taxes. That is wrong. It is deceptive of you to suggest that my opposition to the tax status quo is “class warfare”. It is not. There is already class warfare inherent in a tax regime that hammers wages much heavier than either capital gains or dividends. You may prefer that system, or avert your eyes to it, and PRETEND that there is not a very pernicious inequality and unfairness to any system that taxes accretions to wealth differently, and especially which taxes wages - by far the most painful way to have to earn money - MORE, but I will not do that. Accretions to wealth, however derived, whether from wages or capital gains or dividends or lotteries or inheritances, should be taxed THE SAME. THAT is not “Tax the rich”, and it is not “Class warfare” either. Indeed, to do it ANY OTHER WAY is to engage in a subtle game of class warfare, which says, in effect, that capital gains from the accretion of money on money is somehow more WORTHY than wages earned by sweat, and so wages SHOULD be taxed more. I will not engage in any such distinction or discrimination between the two, because I don’t like class warfare. Accretions to wealth should be taxed THE SAME.
Continuing in this theme, my proposal is the opposite of class warfare. The present system, in the US and France, is class warfare. Wages are brutally taxed. Capital gains are lightly taxed. Dividends are very lightly taxed. And if the GOP in America has its way, estates will not be taxed at all. THAT is class warfare, and markedly in FAVOR of the capital class.
Me? I prefer a simple, fair, unitary tax that taxes only one thing: wealth. Wealth can be accumulated any number of ways: wages, winnings, capital gains, dividends. These things should not be weighed and taxed differently. Rather, the total wealth should be summed up, and a single flat tax rate should be applied to everybody’s wealth. The Gross National Wealth of the United States is about 660 trillion dollars. To generate adequate money to run the budget I would tax wealth at 1%. There would be no corporation tax, no other taxes, just a 1% wealth tax. That is the opposite of class warfare, and the opposite of “tax the rich”.

America doesn’t have a wealth tax. France does. It is only imposed on large holdings, starting at 750,000 Euros. At that level, it is one half of one percent plus change (.55%). The maximum is 1.8%, when one has about $15 million Euros in wealth. I object to the fact that this tax is imposed only on great fortunes. It should be imposed on all of France, and it should be imposed in place of the other taxes, and at a flat rate of 1 or 2%. This is utterly egalitarian, and doesn’t tax the rich any worse than the poor. It is the antithesis of the class warfare you accuse me of. It would produce ample revenue, but without distorting the economy the way other taxes do. As it stands, France does not have that system, but the principle of a wealth tax is a good one, especially considering how badly wages are taxed, so the existing ISF should be left in place.

So, as to this: “It is a confiscatory tax system that is designed to redistribute wealth, even before it is created.”

I disagree. I think it is a neutral revenue-raising measure, based on the most fair way to tax. I will acknowledge that within the cadre of the rest of the French tax code it doesn’t fulfill all of the purposes I think a wealth tax should fulfill, and it is not set high enough or at a level sufficient to tax all people such that it could REPLACE all of the other taxes, from the income tax to the TVA. In principle, however, the wealth tax is as fair as any other tax that takes money away from people - which all taxes do - and I think fairer than most.

“The transportation system in France is not free. The trains are excellent. though very expensive. The Metro, the equivalent of our Subway system is less efficient, doesn’t run all night, is definitely not free, in fact it is more expensive than the NYC Subway system.”

Most of what you say is more or less true. However I disagree with the “less efficient” part. Everyplace is served by the Paris Metro within reasonably close distance. The New York Subway system is much more spread out, and loses its usefulness in the boroughs outside of Manhattan. Metro coverage in Paris is more complete. I do agree that it’s a shame it doesn’t run all night. That people have to pay a fare for transport seems normal to me. Why wouldn’t they?

“NYC has an almost free education system from kindergarten through graduate school.”

Good!
The whole of America should have it.
But the whole of America does not.
Also, NYC has the highest tax rates in America. If you are going to have a system that does what NYC does, you have to pay higher taxes for it. It has to be paid for somehow.

“There is no University in France that is free that compares to the high quality of higher education in the US which is why all the French who can afford it”

I disagree. I went to law school at an Ivy League university in America, and I went to law school at the University of Paris I, Pantheon/Sorbonne. The American school certainly had nicer facilities and more responsive staff than Sorbonne. And the conditions of education and class size were different. However, the density of material and quality of education were absolutely comparable. The French system did not have that “We are the elite” feel that the American top institutions cultivate, but those who did well in the classes were on average better than the average American students at the Ivy League school, and these French lawyers who also studied in America did very well at American schools and in the legal profession. The elite American schools are easier than the plebian, pedestrian and non-elite French general universities, like Sorbonne. Yes, anyone can enter Paris I, but the failure rate is ruthless. Open admission and free tuition mean that all can come, but the professors only pass those who do the work. That is not true at expensive elite American colleges, which practice uniform grade inflation and from which nobody who does the minimum ever fails.

“from Socialists like Dominique Strauss-Kahn on up send their own children to school in the States.”

People come to school in the USA because the USA is the center of the world. It is an experience, and necessary, to understand the Roman society and what the Romans think. Chirac was always proud of his years as a soda jerk. To come and study in America is a rite of passage for many who hope to enter into the higher echelons. It is not because American education is particularly rigorous or one learns a tremendous amount in the American schools. Truth is the students from Grandes Ecoles, assuming they speak English, find American schools less difficult than university in France - because American universities ARE less difficult than university is in France! - but they do it for the cultural experiences and the connections.

“Same for the medical care.
I come from a family with many many doctors. They all treat many Europeans, particularly people from France. The French people who can afford it come here for major health issues.”

I know the French health system as a patient and as the husband and father and son-in-law of patients. The care I have received in France is as good as any care I or my wife or relatives ever received in America, at a more reasonable cost.

“The same for dentists. The “free” dentists in France are worth exactly that... nothing. The free market dentists are excellent, and most of them have trained in Dental Schools in the US. They charge about the same as dentists here.”

My dentist in Paris is in the private sector. He repaired my teeth when they were broken in an accident. His work was as good as the work of my American dentist, and considerably less expensive. My wife has had the same dental care in America as in France. We see no difference in the standard of care. We see a MARKED difference in the price! American dentists are as good as French dentists. They are not better. They cost twice as much.

“Why do you continually mislead people here into believing that France is some kind of social paradise, if only the Muslims would go away?”

I don’t.

“The French themselves don’t believe that for a second.”

Checking, checking. You’re right! I don’t!

“They know their system is bloated, outdated, and in need of massive reform and change.”

And Americans who are honest with themselves know that their system is bloated, inefficient, corrupt and in need of massive reform and change. Does anybody anywhere ever remember a time when the money wasn’t tight and the times weren’t hard? No. That is the human condition. French government is no worse than American government, but it is certainly cheaper, overall. And there are aspects of it, like Social Security and Medicare and public education, which are much better than their American equivalents.

“The high income earners and professional people are leaving France in record numbers to earn more and have more opportunity for advancement.”

Yes, and high income Americans are flocking to China in record numbers for the opportunities there. This does not mean that America is inferior to China. Professionals go where the work is. A country cannot be designed around appealing to high income earners and professionals. Their interests are important, but the interests of the state as a whole are more important.

“The stupid French retirement system of forced retirement that you so highly praise has forced people like Dr. Luc Montaignier, the discoverer of the AIDS virus, to move to the US and work and teach in an American University (Queens College, part of the NYC University system) because the French system refused to employ him after he turned 65.”

Yes, the mandatory retirement age is a travesty and should be ended. But having the state funded single-payer pension insurance is precisely the right solution, and should be adopted by the United States as well, just as US Medicare, which is essentially the same as French Medicare, should be expanded to cover all Americans, and not merely start at 65.

“Four out of the last 6 French Nobel prized were awarded to French living and working in the US.”

Good for them!

“If it weren’t for the Muslim question, would you be in the Socialist camp?”

No.
And I do not consider it a “Muslim” question.
I don’t think that most Beurs are Muslims at all, any more than most French are Catholics. They are Muslims or Catholics in name only. What most are, are secular. I think the problem with the Beurs is the lack of economic opportunity coupled with a marked lack of discipline in Beur areas, which has deprived them of some of the benefits of French education.
If it were not for the law and order problem, I would be UDF. But the law-and-order problem is so pervasive and so threatens the stability of the state and the future of everyone, that if it were not for Sarkozy I would be for the Front National, because Le Pen would break crime.
But there is Sarkozy, so everything is ok.

My objections to the Socialists are manifold, and they are precisely along the lines of the very things you wrongly accused me of at the beginning of your e-mail: they ARE devoted to class warfare and “tax the rich”. I find class warfare to be odious. I believe in equality before the law. That means I believe in flat tax rates, that impact all euros THE SAME. Which is why I believe that a flat wealth tax is the proper tax, because it hits absolutely everybody in precisely the same way, at the same rate, and taxes absolutely everything. That is fair. A system in which capital is favored over wages (the current French system, and ESPECIALLY the current American system) is class warfare - in favor of the money elite. The system that the Socialists always propose of steep progressive taxation and greater wealth redistributions, is class warfare - motivated by jealousy of the money elite. I do not either favor nor hate the money elite. I refuse to acknowledge their existence as a class of people different from anyone else. Everybody should pay the same taxes on the same basis at the same rate. That is egalitarian. Obviously a 2% wealth tax hitting someone with 200,000 Euros of wealth will only produce 4000 Euros, while the same tax striking 20,000,000 Euros of wealth will produce 400,000 Euros, but the effect is precisely the same, and it is not a heavier or lighter tax on either person. It is precisely proportional. Nobody proposes anything like that. The Right wants to take away all wealth taxes, even inheritances. And the Left wants to maintain a wealth tax on high wealth only, and slap on many new taxes. I oppose both of these approaches. Fiscally, I believe that the tax rate should be set sufficient to balance the budget and produce a slight surplus for the paydown of debt. Accordingly, I do not favor tax cuts in either France or America now, where the tax revenues do not match expenditures. However, I do favor shifting the burden around in both places to make it more equitable. No part represents me in these matters in even the USA or France. The UDF comes closest. In America, the Clinton tax policies were the closest compromise position, as they taxed the different areas of the economy more or less evenly, and produced a debt-reducing surplus. I think French taxes should be left alone, and American taxes should be restored to the Clinton taxes. But what I really think is that the tax programs should be scrapped completely in favor of a wealth tax. No party offers this.

The Socialists are odious to me on other grounds. They hate capitalism and nationalize industries, seizing private property for public use. I do not like it when a city in Connecticut takes people’s private homes to give to a drug company for development, and I didn’t like it in France when the Socialists nationalized the banks. Quite the opposite of my wealth tax, which I believe to be class-neutral and fair to all, and merely the necessary expedient for raising the necessary taxes for the operation of the state, the Socialist class-warfare concepts of confiscating private property in an unbalanced way, focusing on a particular social class (the financiers) and seizing their property, not to pay government debt, but for the purposes of waging class warfare and making a statement, I found odious. I believe the people should be secure in their private property, and in their ability to accumulate it. Which is why I oppose unbalanced taxes on wages and income from different sources, and favor a simple, uniform wealth tax. The Socialists would never accept this.

Further, I dislike the Socialists “Internationale” concepts. Europe is a good idea as a trade area, and also to guarantee fundamental human rights. But the Socialsts never miss the opportunity to try and impose rules to confiscate other people’s property using law. Essentially, I think that the Socialists are obsessed with controlling all money, and I find this to be greedy and immoral.

I don’t like the Socialist’s dislike of the nation and its symbols. Le Pen’s strongest asset was always his honest patriotism.

I don’t like the Socialists’ opposition to national defense.

I don’t like the Socialists’ anti-capitalist driven excessive opposition to America.

So, no, I would not be a Socialist at all, and never would have been a socialist, anywhere.

Social Security and Medicare are not socialism.