Europe, Taxing The Wealthy | featured news

France’s new 75 percent income tax on the rich may not be popular with millionaires. But it’s being cheered by another group: Paris real-estate buyers. Real estate agents say that the number of multimillion-dollar real-estate listings in Paris has jumped more than 25 percent over last year – due in part to the threat of the new income tax. More than 400 new listings have come onto the luxury real-estate market over the past six months, they say.

President Francois Hollande's Socialist government unveiled sharp tax hikes on business and the rich on Friday in a 2013 budget aimed at showing France has the fiscal rigour to remain at the core of the euro zone.

The new tax is expected to be formally announced in the government's first budget on 28 September, but that does not mean there is a sense of panic in France. This new tax will only hit very rich individuals and only for a year or two, to help bring down the government deficit.