NFP requires Macron’s support to pass 90% tax hike – which it is unlikely to receive.
France’s left-wing electoral coalition, the New Popular Front, is set to introduce a massive tax increase following its victory in the country’s legislative elections. The left-wing bloc wants to impose a 90 percent tax rate on all French men and women who have an annual income of over 400,000 euros ($430,000).
The NFP first proposed this massive tax hike in late June, when Eric Coquerel of the far-left La France Insoumise party – the largest party in the NFP and one of the most radical – who represents the first constituency of Seine-Saint-Denis admitted during a television interview that the coalition would raise the top marginal income tax rate to 90 percent on the wealthiest members of French society.
La France Insoumise has previously tried to pass a similar proposal back in 2019 which would apply to all taxable income over 411,683 euros annually ($445,000). Currently, the income tax rate in France tops out at 45 percent on income over $177,106 euros annually ($192,000).
It should also be noted that the last time French politicians tried to introduce a top income tax rateanywhere close to what La France Insoumise and the NFP are proposing was during the administration of left-wing former President Francois Hollande – current President Emmanuel Macron’s predecessor. Hollande’s proposal was for a 75 percent rate on all income above one million euros ($1.1 million).
France’s top constitutional court – the Constitutional Council – threw out the proposal, forcing Hollande to transform the proposal into a temporary levy paid by corporations on all salaries above one million euros.
NFP requires Macron’s support to pass 90% tax hike – which it is unlikely to receive
The NFP came out of France’s recently concluded legislative election as the largest group in the National Assembly. However, despite its commanding presence with its 180 seats, it does not have the necessary 289 seats to form a majority.
Macron’s liberal and centrist Ensemble coalition came in second with 159 seats – thanks in no small part to an anti-conservative alliance Macron formed with the NFP – and the major conservative and anti-illegal immigration National Rally party and its allies came in third with 142 seats despite winning the most votes.
The lack of a majority in the National Assembly means the NFP will have to reach out – most likely to Macron, smaller parties and independents not aligned with National Rally – to get its 90 percent marginal income tax rate proposal passed.
Furthermore, before the NFP can even table its income tax hike proposal, the National Assembly still needs to figure out if it can form a stable majority that can govern for the next five years, and the first step is for Macron to appoint a prime minister who will be tasked with forming a government that can survive a vote of no confidence.
“The president must appoint as prime minister someone from the New Popular Front to implement the NFP’s program, the whole program and nothing but the program,” said Manuel Bompard, coordinator of La France Insoumise and deputy for Bouches-du-Rhone’s fourth constituency. “We are preparing to govern, to apply the program which is ours.”
Other NFP domestic proposals include lowering the retirement age from 64 to 60, committing at least 150 billion euros ($162 billion) in spending on public services over the next three years and raising the minimum wage by 14 percent and forever linking salaries to inflation, increasing government investment on the so-called green transition and imposing price controls on essential goods and services such as food, fuel and utilities like electricity and heat.
On foreign affairs, the NFP is calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the recognition of the State of Palestine, a halt to Russia’s “war of aggression” in Ukraine, more military aid spending for Kyiv and “unfailing” defense for the “sovereignty and freedom” of the Ukrainian people.
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