Pigeons, Taxes and ‘Startuppeurs’

Pigeons, Taxes and ‘Startuppeurs’

By CELESTINE BOHLEN

PARIS — So how did a flock of pigeons—a French slang word adopted by
a group of startup entrepreneurs who don’t want to be fall guys for the
government’s efforts to plug its budget gap—manage to shift the debate
in France over an increase in the tax on capital gains?

The answer, according to the movement’s spokesman, Jean-David Chamboredon,
lies in their approach, which broke the traditional mold of French
political discourse.
First they put their protest up on Facebook,
instead of taking to the streets. Within 15 days, they had 67,000
“likes,” many posted by French entrepreneurs outraged at proposed tax
legislation that for certain top-end investors, would increase their
liability on capital gains from 34.5 percent to 63.5 percent.
Secondly,
these cool, irreverent “startuppeurs”— a coinage used among French
internet investors —have softened the image of the fat capitalist
patron, which historically, has been the cartoon-like cliché which many
French people love to hate.
Within days of their Sept. 28
launch, the pigeons had managed to win a partial rollback of the
government’s tax plan, the subject of my Page Two column.
The legislation heading to the National Assembly now exempts capital
earned by active founders from the sale of their companies.
But the entrepreneurs are not satisfied, saying that the French startup
companies will be fatally wounded by “brutal” measures that would
deprive them of venture capital. “If you tell people that they have one
in two chances to lose money, but if they earn money, they will be taxed
at 60 percent, there’s absolutely no reason to invest,” said Mr.
Chamboredon, who heads the Paris-based investment firm ISAI.

The pigeons have also galvanized the patrons into signing a joint
statement, issued last Tuesday by a dozen business organizations,
declaring an “entrepreneurial state of emergency,” and calling on the
government to redraft its capital gains tax package.


Mr. Chamboredon argues that the pigeon protest has upended the usual
sequence of French politics, which typically begins with discreet
consultations and later erupts in the street. This time, he said, the
protests—held peacefully on the internet—have kick-started a national
discussion.
But a question remains: Will the pigeons take flight? Already, the French press has become obsessed with tracking the migration of rich people—from
business tycoons to movie actors—who, it is thought, are moving to
Belgium or elsewhere, fleeing the government’s heavy-handed tax
policies.

“I know a lot of people who are spending a lot of time
these days with their tax lawyers,” said Mr. Chamboredon. “If you have a
company and you know you will have to sell it, you need to think about
it and exiting France is a scenario.”


By CELESTINE BOHLEN - 12 oct 2012
SOURCES : http://rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/12/pigeons-taxes-and-startuppeurs/