A French economist behind a wealth tax plan on Sunday hit back at the country's richest person who claimed the academic wanted to destroy the French economy.
With France under pressure to reduce its €44 billion debt pile and budget deficit, Gabriel Zucman has suggested that the ultra-rich pay at least a 2 percent tax on their fortune.
"This is clearly not a technical or economic debate, but rather a clearly stated desire to destroy the French economy," said Bernard Arnault in a statement to the British newspaper The Sunday Times.
Arnault, whose family fortune is estimated at $157 billion by Forbes, described Zucman as "first and foremost a far-left activist ... who puts at the service of his ideology ... a pseudo-academic competence that is itself widely debated".
Zucman says his plan could raise around €20 billion euros per year from 1,800 households.
"We can have fundamental disagreements, and Arnault is entitled, like all citizens, to his opinions. But this debate must take place with respect for the truth and the facts," Zucman told the French news agency AFP.
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International posts
Zucman, who has held academic posts in London, the United States and Paris, said: "Mr Arnault is wrong to question my professional qualifications by referring to me as having 'pseudo-academic competence.'"
He compared such statements to the language used by President Donald Trump and his allies in the US where concern is growing over academic freedoms.
"With the rise of Trumpism, I have seen this rhetoric flourish, denigrating knowledge and research in the United States," warned Zucman.
Zucman, a professor at France’s École Normale Supérieure and the University of California, Berkeley, rejected the accusations of political partisanship.
"I've never been an activist for any movement or party," he said on social media, adding his work was grounded in research, not ideology.
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Political support
The 38-year-old received support from left-wing leaders who expressed shock at the comments from 76-year-old Arnault whose LVMH conglomerate includes brands such as Louis Vuitton, Dior and Moet Hennessy.
Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure wrote on social media: "What destroys our economy and even more so our society is the absence of any form of patriotism on the part of the ultra-rich who beg for help from the state but refuse to submit to any form of solidarity."
Greens leader, Marine Tondelier, said: "We're close to the goal and he's getting nervous."
But Zucman came under fire from the right where politicians fear that such a scheme would drive the wealthy to flee France.
"Zucman's tax idea is intellectually very weak," said Jean-Philippe Tanguy, an MP for the Rassemblement National during an interview on Sunday with France Inter and franceinfo TV.
"When you look at the work that has been done on tax justice and the increase in income and wealth inequality since the opening of the capital markets in the 1980s and 1990s and the unfortunate globalisation, to say that the outcome of this reflection is to target the richest - those with more than €100 million in assets - and impose a 2 percent tax, seems to me to be a very simplistic solution, a bit like a slogan."
(With newswires)
