On Wednesday, CBN News reported that France was ending its super tax on millionaires.

The article reports:

Socialist President Francois Hollande proposed a tax of up to 75 percent on people earning above 1 million euros a year, equal to about $1.2 million a year in the United States. 

One critic of the super-tax said it makes France “Cuba without the sun.”

Many wealthy French citizens fled the country to avoid paying the super tax, including actor Gerard Depardieu, who became a Russian citizen. 

Because millionaires left the country or found tax shelters, the excessive tax did not generate nearly the amount of money that politicians predicted it would.

What is at play here is the Laffer Curve.

On April 15, 2012, Forbes Magazine posted a graph of the Laffer Curve:

Contrary to what you may have heard, people are not stupid. If it becomes obvious that the harder they work the more will be taken from them, they will not work as hard. There is a point where excessive taxation does not reap positive rewards. Congress  needs to remember this. It didn’t work in France, and it won’t work in America.