According to a Cluster 17 survey for “Le Point”, three out of four French people consider the tax system unfair. The middle classes consider themselves particularly aggrieved.
By Sebastien Schneegans
© SERGE TENANI / Hans Lucas / Hans Lucas via AFP
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Uhe large majority of French people believe that the current tax system is “unfair”. This is what a Cluster 17 survey reveals* For Point. In detail, 49% of respondents find it “rather unfair” and 25%, “completely unfair”. This feeling is shared by all the clusters (the political families formed by the institute, from moderates to radicals). “It is within the most disruptive and anti-system electorates that this feeling of injustice is the most diffuse, notes Stéphane Fournier, director of studies at Cluster 17. Here we find the “arch of protest” of close clusters yellow vests, which ranges from Solidarity and Multiculturalism to groups closer to the RN: Refractories and Social-Patriots. Thus, 85% of Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Marine Le Pen’s voters in the first round of the 2022 presidential election consider the tax system “unfair”.
This poll also highlights a classic right-left divide. To the question “Do you feel like you are paying too much tax, not enough tax or just the right amount?” », the voters of the right and of the left do not bring the same answer. Unsurprisingly, voters on the left mostly share the feeling of paying their fair share – 57% of voters in Mélenchon and 59% of voters in Jadot, for example –, while voters on the right feel they are overtaxed: 63% of voters of Pécresse, 69% of voters of Le Pen and 77% of voters of Zemmour.
READ ALSOThe French and the taboo of moneyThere is also an obvious correlation between the answer to this question and the income of the respondents: the higher their income, the more the respondents consider themselves “too much taxed”. Thus, 66% of French people who receive more than 5,000 euros per month claim to pay “too much tax” – a figure significantly higher than all other income classes. The middle classes, to which Emmanuel Macron promised, during his interview at 8 p.m. with TF1, on May 15, two billion tax cuts by 2027, consider themselves particularly wronged. 58% of French people earning between 1,750 euros and 2,500 euros per month say they pay “too much tax”. It is exactly to these French people that the President of the Republic addressed himself, to “those who are too rich to be helped and not rich enough to live well”, according to his expression.
READ ALSOTax cuts: who are the French middle class?
A tax “at the same time”
This choice to lower the taxes of the middle classes is also acclaimed by a third of the French people questioned. However, those polled seem to be calling for a tax “at the same time”: less taxes for the middle classes but more taxes for the wealthy – 40% of French people are in favor of it. “If left-wing voters are naturally the most favorable to this tax increase for the wealthiest, this wish is shared by a third of Marine Le Pen’s electorate and 22% of Emmanuel Macron’s voters”, observes Stéphane Fournier .
READ ALSOFrance on the way to smicardisationThe survey carried out by Cluster 17 offers a final interesting lesson. A relative consensus emerges on the definition of the “threshold of wealth”. If the working classes place it at 5,500 euros, the differences are small between the clusters and between the electorates. On average, to the question “From what level of monthly income do you think a person is rich?” “, the respondents answered 6,180 euros.
*Study carried out by Cluster 17 for Point from a sample of 1,879 people representative of the French population aged 18 and over. The sample is drawn up according to the quota method, with regard to the criteria of sex, age, socio-professional category, type of municipality and region of residence. Online self-administered questionnaire. Interviews conducted from May 19 to 21, 2023.