French Soccer Clubs To Strike Over 75% Tax Rate

[Straight Shooter]

Autumn in France means three things: Beaujolais, soccer, and strikes. It was probably only a matter of time before the French combined two of their national pastimes. The owners of the country’s top two soccer leagues (called, appropriately, Ligue 1 and Ligue 2) yesterday voted to stage a soccer strike. During the last weekend in November, no games will be played.

Americans are accustomed to the spectacle of sports strikes—in the U.S., professional sports are one of the last bastions of private sector unionization. Yet unlike when Major League Baseball or National Hockey League players stage a walkout, this dispute is between team owners and the government. It’s being called to protest President Francois Hollande’s 75 percent marginal tax on all salaries over 1 million euros.

Hollande, a socialist, made the tax a central plank of his campaign last year. In its original form it was to be paid by wealthy workers, but after being struck down by France’s highest court as unconstitutionally high, it was shifted to employers. That’s why it’s the teams, rather than the players, that are striking, asking for an exemption from the tax. Many French teams operate at a loss—Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 reportedly lost $149 million in total last season—and owners complain that the strike could put many of them out of business.

Traditionally, France’s top teams have not been big spenders, at least when compared with those in Spain, England, and Italy. As a result, the country has a long tradition of producing superstar soccer players like Michel Platini, Zinedine Zidane, and Thierry Henry through its world-class youth programs, then losing them to clubs elsewhere that can pay far more.

Still, compared with the average French business, professional soccer teams employ a disproportionately high number of millionaires. And that number is climbing as the Russian oligarchs and Persian Gulf sheikhs who have been buying up teams elsewhere in Europe have turned to France: The Qatar Investment Authority last year bought the club Paris Saint-Germain, and has gone on a spending spree. PSG alone would owe 20 million euros this year under Hollande’s tax, according to a report on the France 2 television station.

It can be a surprise for an American to witness the sympathy most French people extend to striking workers, despite the disruption and inconvenience strikes can entail. Art Goldhammer, a researcher at Harvard’s Center for European Studies and a writer on French politics, points out that even during a notorious 1995 transit strike that paralyzed the country, there was widespread support for the strikers. “In general, strikes do command a substantial degree of support,” he says. It’s only when strikers resort to “relatively violent tactics like threatening to blow up factories or holding managers hostage,” he says, that public opinion turns against them.

Or, it turns out, when the strikers are the wealthy owners of soccer teams. A poll conducted yesterday by Tilder-LCI-OpinionWay found that 85 percent of the French do not think the soccer teams should be exempted from the tax, and 83 percent are against the strike. The politics of soccer stars and taxes are fraught: Lionel Messi, an Argentine widely considered the best player in the world, is battling charges of tax fraud in Spain, where he plays professionally. President Hollande said today that the French teams would not be exempted from the tax. So far, France’s sports moguls are pretty much alone on the barricades.

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-10-25/france-finally-meets-a-strike-it-doesnt-like

Say what you want about "tax and spend liberals", but you won't find a mainstream liberal in the U.S who would advocate for a 75% tax rate

 

[Jack Davenport]

It was close to that before Reagan cut them. IIRC they were at 72 percent for the highest wage earners. Yesterday, before I had to get into the gutter with a poster we had touched on this. The team shoule rename themself the DePardieus (sp)

 

[georges]

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-10-25/france-finally-meets-a-strike-it-doesnt-like

Say what you want about "tax and spend liberals", but you won't find a mainstream liberal in the U.S who would advocate for a 75% tax rate

You are correct but you have to remember that Hollande nicknamed the "flabby testicle" or la "couille molle" is the least popular president in France with only 23% of approval rate. A lot of foreign firms aren't going to invest in France because of this tax. So all he does is raising taxes, creating more civil servants jobs but he doesn't relaunch the industries, doesn't know how to attract foreign investors and speaks English like a fucking ass hole beginner and add to this that he likes a certain category of voters.With him since his election, unemployment rate has always been on the rise. Like I said for the next local, regional and european elections, I and several other millions will give a huge slap in the face to Hollande and to all the ass holes that support such an irresponsible socialist garbage president and to all his unpatriotic sons of bitches from his government.

 

[tartanterrier]

You are correct but you have to remember that Hollande nicknamed the "flabby testicle" or la "couille molle" is the least popular president in France with only 23% of approval rate. A lot of foreign firms aren't going to invest in France because of this tax. So all he does is raising taxes, creating more civil servants jobs but he doesn't relaunch the industries, doesn't know how to attract foreign investors and speaks English like a fucking ass hole beginner and add to this that he likes a certain category of voters.With him since his election, unemployment rate has always been on the rise. Like I said for the next local, regional and european elections, I and several other millions will give a huge slap in the face to Hollande and to all the ass holes that support such an irresponsible socialist garbage president and to all his unpatriotic sons of bitches from his government.

How long does he have left in his term :dunno: Would it be daft to consider that he would get a second

 

[georges]

How long does he have left in his term :dunno: Would it be daft to consider that he would get a second

till 2017 but many think that he won't finish his first term. A second term with him would be catastrophic on all results, we would have a complete loss of French identity, we will have to face radical islamists, we will have a country with zero industries but just civil servants, health care leech offs, loads of criminals and illegals as well as a disappearance of the middle class, add to this risks of a civil war. No thanks, time to close the frontiers, stop letting immigrants which invade our country by hundred of thousands every year and who benefit from the health care system when they never busted their asses off. This has to stop.

 

[tartanterrier]

till 2017 but many think that he won't finish his first term. A second term with him would be catastrophic on all results, we would have a complete loss of French identity, we will have to face radical islamists, we will have a country with zero industries but just civil servants, health care leech offs, loads of criminals and illegals as well as a disappearance of the middle class, add to this risks of a civil war. No thanks, time to close the frontiers, stop letting immigrants which invade our country by hundred of thousands every year and who benefit from the health care system when they never busted their asses off. This has to stop.

I guess that's what they call globalisation.Not that i'm against it.But if it affects the countries health care system, and other public services that people really depend upon, then that's where they should draw the line, until they can cope with having more.

I think most Western European countires suffer this (some more than most) even in Scotland, where our government are letting in as many Eastern Europeans and asylum seekers as they can get.In the hope that they will help the Scottish Nationalists win the fight on independence from the UK.

 

[rivasky]

Does the 75% tax rate apply to AS Monaco?

 

[georges]

Does the 75% tax rate apply to AS Monaco?

Yes to all clubs who are in the ligue 1 which is the equivalent of the English premier ligue.

 

[rivasky]

My question has been answered. Monaco is exempt from the tax.

http://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/2013/12/14/monaco-exempted-super-tax-latest-twist

 

[meesterperfect]

Say what you want about "tax and spend liberals", but you won't find a mainstream liberal in the U.S who would advocate for a 75% tax rate

by mainstream you mean like a politician?
I am sure there are many (as long as theyre somehow exempt from it) , I can think of a few who I'm sure would love it.
They just know that if they endorsed it publicly they would hurt their political careers.
So instead they just sneak in numerous ways to rob the people who produce, making it not quite 75% but damn close.
In the US, depending on where you live, if you add up all the taxes you pay it comes close to half of what you earn......even from the ever dwindling middle class folks.

As far as the futbol goes, good, I wish more businesses there would follow suit. i mean after 75% income tax plus other taxes what the hell is left? Enough money to buy socks?
Dont these idiots realize that these people create business, employ masses, generate tons of tax revenue each year? Dont kill the Golden goose.

by the way , how ya'll been round here? Good? Cool.

 

[Johan]

Actually the Senate (wich is the french equivalent of the US House) has rejected the 75% tax, wich is quite strange 'cause the majority of senators are from the Socialist Party, the same party that is currently in office...

IMHO, that 75% taxe is a total BS : Hollande made that prmise during the campaign to rally on him some of the extreme righ voters. Everybody else knew it was absolutely impossible to have à 75% tax rate but now Hollande is stuck with that shit : It has been one of the proimise he made that was the most talked about, if he gives it up, it would be like admitting that all his campaign was a massive BS. It's already the 2nd version of the law, the first one was rejected by the Conseil Constitutionel (Constitutional Council, a group of people that has to verify if the laws are valid according to our Constitution).
Honestly, I don't think this 75% tax rate will ever be...

 

[meesterperfect]

So if it aint 75% what is it at this moment?