You might have seen in the news a few weeks ago that a minister in the latest socialist French government has been caught out stashing his cash in Switzerland and Singapore. According to the Figaro almost ¾ of the french population profess to be profoundly shocked by such unpatriotic behaviour effected by a politician specially sponsored by the 75% tax president Hollande the Socialist.

Before this minister was invited into government he practiced as a plastic surgeon but I don’t think he can have been highly qualified as his speciality was hair implants and I can’t imagine a lot of damage can be caused by such surgical interventions. However, the financial damage his customers suffered must have been considerable, as bald fellows just love to show  a lot of hair and Dr. Cahuzac, future socialist minister, must have raked in the boodle handsomely. So what, to each his own but that is not a french government expression, theirs is ‘from each to us’. Evidently the doctor made a plan to keep his money instead of losing at least half of it.

Here I must explain a fundamental verity of living in France. Since the beginning of the 1900’s each government has excelled in producing the best tax inspectors in the world. At the same time the poor Frenchies have been burdened by taxes higher than anywhere else, except when the Brit socialists began to kill the UK in the 60’s.  French tax officials assume that the average tax payer is going to cheat, so, in order to get a reasonable 50, he will impose100 that cannot be paid because that would kill the taxpayer. Thus a system is born where all taxpayers have to cheat and become  criminally liable to the income tax minister. He knows that these buggers are cheating otherwise they would be dead or in the madhouse if they had paid what was legally demanded. There is a great advantage for the tax minister in such a system; he knows that all taxpayers are culpable and at a whim he can send highly trained inspectors to anyone, without a warrant, for a few months to inspect the finances. Inevitably something is found and a huge fine is the result. A fiscal control such an intervention is called and not a business will escape it every 4-8 years.

How do I know these things you might ask. My wife and I did business for almost a quarter century in France; we did quite well but not millionaire stuff. Income tax was a big headache but we were assisted by a one of those redoubtable tax inspectors that had retired. Most of these fellows retire after 25 years of loyal and legal robbery for the state and then set themselves up as tax advisers. Fortunately for us this bloke was a friend of Micheline’s mother and did not make us pay too much for his advice. He clearly explained to me how to complete the tax returns and the logic behind his system with the result that income tax did not ruin us. Later, one of these tax inspectors became disgusted with the whole tax system in France and wrote an excellent book, explaining how the civil service exploited and robbed the french population. Although by that time we were not living in France anymore I read his book with great interest because it laid bare the usurious means by which French citizens are legally robbed by the state.

Of course, reading a bit further in the newspapers it became plain that the french people were not upset by this minister trying to keep most of his money because every french person does the same, if possible. They were disgusted that it was a minister whose job it was to make them pay more.

For many years many other welfare states have been admiring the blatant robbery as practiced by the French state but silly things like a constitution prevented them from applying the same methods. Not any more, all these countries that borrowed up to bankruptcy are beginning to apply similar methods under the guise of reducing the cost of government. But as that can’t be done without reducing government, taxes still have a long healthy life in front of them.

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Some time ago I wrote that Nelson Mandela had to be dead. Sofar, he, himself, has not denied it, other people do. I’ve always wondered about Mandela’s promoter, he must be one of the most brilliant publicity chaps ever. Here we have a junior lawyer without a reputation thrown into jail and carefully kept by the apartheid state for 27 years and when he steps out he is worldwide proclaimed as a statesman,  a martyr, an artist, a saviour, anything you wish to name him as long as it is saintly. After a quick turn as president he decides to retire and less than 10 years out of jail he does just that, comfortably settled with a billion or so Rands (100 million dollars). If this is not the work of a promoter, the Boere must have taught him a great deal on Robben Island but that I doubt.