<h5>This tax on inheritance which makes the French flee</h5>&NewLine;<p>Inheritance tax has become a strategic issue for countries wishing to attract wealthy taxpayers from all over the world, so much so that a majority of them have opted either to abolish it or to abolish the tax on inheritance. <a href="https://vivreauportugalconsulting.com/regime-fiscal-du-resident-non-habituel/">Portugal</a> and Sweden&comma; or for their decrease&comma; following the example of the United States and Italy&period;</p>&NewLine;<p>In the name of the "French tax exception", we have chosen to increase this tax rather than reduce it, even if it means mourning the successive departures of our wealthiest compatriots, who go off to live and die under less taxed skies...</p>&NewLine;<p>Some well-known taxpayers&colon; Florent Pagny&comma; Charles Aznavour&comma; Johnny Hallyday &semi; and above all a cohort of unknown taxpayers&period; All have one thing in common&period; They left France&comma; generally with wife and children&comma; for more or less self-confessed tax reasons&period; Among the many advantages conferred on foreigners is that they can&semi;avoid paying French inheritance tax&semi; provided, however, that their heirs also reside abroad&semi;&period;</p>&NewLine;<h5>One of the highest taxes in the world</h5>&NewLine;<p>In France&comma; the marginal tax rate on direct line inheritances&comma; i.e. between parents and children&comma; is... 45 &percnt; &semi; which is the highest rate in the European Union&period; By way of comparison&comma; this rate is only 30 &percnt; in Germany&comma; 15 &percnt; in Denmark and even 4 &percnt; in Italy&period; Moreover&comma; this is the third highest rate in the world&comma; in direct line&comma; after Japan &lpar;55 &percnt;&rpar; and South Korea &lpar;50 &percnt;&rpar;&period;</p>&NewLine;<p>S&rsquo&semi;add to this exorbitant rate the fact that France has&rsquo&semi;one of the world's lowest inheritance tax allowances per direct line&lpar;amount exempt&rsquo&semi;from inheritance tax&colon; 100,000 euros versus 1 million&rsquo&semi;euros in Italy and now 11&comma;2 million dollars in the USA&period;</p>&NewLine;<p>And taxation is even more confiscatory for other heirs, since they can be taxed up to 55 &percnt;&period; S&rsquo&semi;they are part of the family and even up to 60 &percnt;&comma; without any allowance&comma; in the opposite case&period;</p>&NewLine;<h5>A tax that has recently increased</h5>&NewLine;<p>Already high&comma; inheritance tax has been progressively increased in recent years&period; The marginal tax rate applicable to direct descendants was thus raised in 2013 from 40 &percnt; to 45 &percnt;&period; In addition&comma; the amount of the&rsquo&semi;abatement applicable &lpar;montant exonéré d&rsquo&semi;impôt&rpar;&period; Has been reduced by more than&rsquo&semi;a third in 2012&comma; from 159,325 euros to 100,000 euros&period; Not to mention that the conditions for benefiting from the latter have been significantly tightened&period; Insofar as the "rapport fiscal" period&comma; i.e. the period applicable for an heir to benefit from the "abatement" at the time of inheritance&period; after having benefited from it in respect of a previous gift has been more than doubled&colon; initially set at 6 years&comma; it was raised to 10 years in 2011... then to 15 years in 2012&period;</p>&NewLine;<h5>Freeze in the tax scale</h5>&NewLine;<p>S&rsquo&semi;add to this the freezing of the inheritance tax scale since 2012 &lpar;the latter was previously indexed to&rsquo&semi;inflation&comma; like the income tax scale&rpar;&period; And the tightening of the split payment system&comma; which allows heirs to&rsquo&semi;spread over time the settlement of their tax&period; The settlement period, which could&comma; in certain circumstances&period; S&rsquo&semi;spread over up to 10 years, was reduced in 2015 to just 3 years&period; However, this period is very often difficult to meet&semi; so much so that some heirs are led to part with&comma; against their will&comma; part of the assets they have inherited&period;</p>&NewLine;<p>Finally&comma; the rate of&rsquo&semi;interest owed by heirs to benefit from this fractional payment has also been modified in 2015 insofar as has been substituted for the very low&comma; or even zero legal rate &lpar;0 &percnt; in 2013 and 2014&rpar;&comma; a rate of&rsquo&semi;interest indexed on fixed-rate home loans granted to individuals &lpar;2&comma;2 &percnt; in 2015&rpar;&period;</p>&NewLine;<p>As a result, revenues from inheritance tax&comma; and secondarily from gifts&comma; have soared in recent years&semi; from&rsquo&semi;around 7&comma;7 billion&semi;euros in 2011&comma; to over 12 billion&semi;euros in 2016 according to Eurostat&comma; representing an increase of 56 &percnt; in just 6 years&excl;</p>&NewLine;<h5>And that could still increase in the next few years...</h5>&NewLine;<p>How to remedy the problem of confiscatory taxation of French inheritances&quest; By taxing them a little more&literally&or a lot&excl;&rpar; more&period; Of course&excl; According to France Stratégie&comma; l&rsquo&semi;OFCE and more recently the Conseil des prélèvements obligatoires&comma; the French inheritance tax&comma; even if it is already one of the highest in the world&comma; is still not high enough to meet the objective that some have set for it&comma; namely "to curb the share of inheritance in the constitution of household wealth"&period; Another very French battle&excl;</p>&NewLine;<p>As a result, in its latest report, the Conseil des Prélèvements Obligatoires (French council on compulsory levies) proposed reducing or even abolishing the 100,000-euro allowance for children, as giving them preferential tax treatment is no longer really in vogue. It goes without saying that such an abolition would have an impact on all French households, not just the most affluent... So let's put French inheritances on alert...</p>&NewLine;<h5>Many countries have abolished this tax</h5>&NewLine;<p>Once again&comma; France is totally at odds with the rest of the world&period; Since the early 2000s&period; 15 of the 35 OECD countries have abolished the&rsquo&semi;inheritance tax&comma; among them Portugal &lpar;2004&rpar;&comma; Sweden &lpar;2005&rpar; Russia &lpar;2005&rpar;&comma; l&rsquo&semi;Austria &lpar;2008&rpar;&comma; Czech Republic &lpar;2014&rpar; and Norway &lpar;2014&rpar;&period; L&rsquo&semi;Italy also abolished them in 2001 before reintroducing them in 2006 at a very low rate&period;</p>&NewLine;<p>As we can see&comma; it is not the countries that tax or redistribute the least that have abolished inheritance tax&period; The level of tax pressure and public spending in Sweden and Austria&period; Being relatively close to those in France&period; This illustrates the fact that some protective countries have been able to put their economic prosperity before a destructive tax ideology&period; In Sweden&comma; welfare state par excellence&comma; it was the Social Democrats who abolished inheritance tax&semi; which had a beneficial impact, since the famous founder of&rsquo&semi;IKEA&comma; Ingvar Kamprad&comma; and other leading industrialists&comma; have chosen to return to France after several years of tax&period expatriation;</p>&NewLine;<h5>A trend for economic and moral reasons</h5>&NewLine;<p>There are both economic and moral reasons for this trend to abolish or at least abolish inheritance taxes; Countries faced with increasingly intense tax competition know that they must reduce capital taxes, or risk losing their taxpayers&period; Secondly, from a moral point of view, inheritance tax has the disadvantage of sacrificing the intergenerational and family conception of property in favour of a purely mono-generational and individualistic conception, which limits the scope of parental transmission to mainly immaterial elements such as education or moral values;</p>&NewLine;<blockquote><p>It goes without saying that the state's monopolization of inheritances is not to the taste of all those who have worked all their lives hoping to bequeath the fruits of their labor to their children&period;</p></blockquote>&NewLine;<p><a href="http://www.lefigaro.fr/vox/economie/2018/03/06/31007-20180306artfig00124-impot-sur-les-successions-il-ne-fait-pas-bon-mourir-francais.php">Source</a></p>&NewLine;
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