By
Bloomberg
Published
September 8, 2025
Imposing heavy taxes on the rich won’t extricate France from its budget morass and would only push them to leave the country, according to French Prime Minister Francois Bayrou.
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The premier, speaking in the National Assembly ahead of a confidence vote, was countering the call by some left-leaning parties to raise taxes on people like Bernard Arnault, the billionaire CEO of luxury giant LVMH, to close the country’s budget gap.
“Bernard Arnault and his ilk have become the emblematic targets of magical thinking; they’re like voodoo dolls with needles stuck in them to hurt them and, I imagine, hit them in the wallet,” he said. “Those who are targeted have a very simple and immediate response. They move.”
Arnault is Europe’s richest person, ranking eighth on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, with a net worth of $164 billion.
The prime minister called the confidence motion last month in a bid to pressure lawmakers to back his plan to narrow France’s 2026 budget deficit to 4.6% of economic output from an expected 5.4% this year. His proposal includes €44 billion ($51.6 billion) of spending cuts and tax hikes. The vote, expected later tonight, will likely lead to his government’s collapse.
Bayrou cited Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands as possible destinations for the rich or their businesses. He also brought up Italy, implying that wealthy people leaving the UK were moving there.
“Ask our British neighbors, they decided to tax foreigners who were exempt from taxation,” Bayrou said. “The immediate consequence was the explosion of real estate prices in Milan.”