Most of the time wealth is the by-product of pursuing a talent or passion. I'm not sure high taxes would disincentivize somebody from reaching the height of their ambition.
Presented with the option "improve performance and you'll receive an extra 100k a year although you'll only see 50k of that" would you:
A. plod along with current work-ethic and current salary
B. move to where you'd see 80k of that
C. Continue to perform and be 50k wealthier
France loses the talent of those that choose option B (See: London) but option A seems illogical.
This is actually is a lot more subtle. Sure there are heavy taxes about which that some (ideologically interested) people love to complain about. But there are also a lot of public subsidies that those very same people will never publicly acknowledge benefiting from (again pushing an agenda).
One of the main points of VC funding is that it is easy to get... compared to state funding.
An early stage venture ain't developing anything if they are busy filling government paperwork and optimizing taxes. They should be busy using their resources for growth and creation, not busy trying to protect their resources from the government.
The schemes for tax avoidance in France are very complex, as much as the schemes to get government help [for a company], and they can totally backfire if there is anything misdone or an unexpected change in government.
The economic system is anti-startup and pro-big companies. That's why there are very few SME in France.
You're right about the system being tailored toward Big Co.
Yet I've seen SME managing to get subsidies. There are tricks and shortcut. Networking is key here to find out about them.
I've seen a lot of startups joining up to have access to bigger founds they would have had alone. It also split the bureaucracy burden as it is in everyone interest to succeed so paperwork is mutualised.
The "Wealth Tax" (Impôt sur la fortune) can be cut in half via investment into SMEs.
Pro-tip when you raise capital in France: do it early in the fiscal year, as April is the deadline for this tax avoidance scheme ;)
There are lots of tax optimisations in the french tax code. The weirdest one has to be investment into "sofica" companies, which are shell companies for movie productions. You have to make sure that the movie will fail to maximise your tax credit. So you have to pick wisely: do not invest in the next Asterix or Luc Besson movie, you'd end up loosing money to the IRS. That's one of the reasons hollywood accounting is also a thing in France. The idea is not to massively undercut the author, but to make sure the investors aren't hit with back taxes!
Presented with the option "improve performance and you'll receive an extra 100k a year although you'll only see 50k of that" would you:
A. plod along with current work-ethic and current salary
B. move to where you'd see 80k of that
C. Continue to perform and be 50k wealthier
France loses the talent of those that choose option B (See: London) but option A seems illogical.