SMALL INCOMES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 226, 24 September 1938, Page 18

SMALL INCOMES.

rEW RICK FRENCHMEN. PARIS. The statistic** concerning the payments of. income tax made in 1937—that is to say, on the incomes of 1936 —show once morfi to what an extent France is a country of many small incomes and few really large ones. No doubt a certain allowance must be made for the fact that evasion by insufficient declaration is certainly larger in France than it is in Engalnd; but as it is only on incomes of moderate size that evasion ia practically possible this fact rather confirms than infirm* the conclusion that the Preach are apeople of modest individual wealth. The figures show that nearly half the total number of income taxpayers had incomes of less than 20,000 francs a year each, or under £115 at present exekange, while threequarters had incomes of less than £160. These three-quarters together paid almost-exactly half of the total income tax collected in the country. At tha other end 1 of the Bcale, there were only just over 400 persona in France with incomes of more than a million francs (say, £5500) each, although these 400 had an average income of more than twice as much. The number of these large fortunes has, moreover, been decreasing in recent years; for in 1030 there were 700 millionaire* (in francs, but Poincare francs) as against the 400 iti devaluated francs to-day, while in the following year there were still nearly 500. ..