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A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

visa.lafrenchtech.com

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Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#251

Post by coredog64 »

LunaSea wrote: post #98
pyrale wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's actually quite a lot of competition within EU, and France is not too shameful in that competition. It's hard to compete with London which is undoubtedly the #1 tech hub in Europe, but aside from that, Paris is top notch. Also, you're begging the question.

I would still pick Berlin or Amsterdam over France. Maybe even Sweden or Finland because of the average English language level spoken in those countries even though the startup scene there is smaller than Paris.

France, or Paris? The joke my former (Parisian) co-worker used to tell was that he missed everything about Paris except the Parisians. I've heard nice things about Lyon: Largish city, easily accessible, and not full of Parisians.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#252

Post by frwo »

yardie wrote: post #216
frwo wrote: post #172

French salaries are much lower and taxes are extremely high for high income earners. There's more than one tax on your income! There's the regular "impôt" but also the "contribution solidarité" which is legally considered "not a tax" but cost you a percentage of your income. And a "taxe d'habitation" too (which is proportional to your rent rather than income). There's quite a bit of misrepresentation and wordplay all…

I've lived in France and the US. At the lowend salaries are almost the same. In continental Europe its extremely hard to break the 6-figure salary barrier. Now that I'm working back in the US after 12 years abroad I find we're at about the same level if we'd stayed in Paris. Salary is up but so are healthcare costs, childcare costs, transportation. While my effectively salary is double my take home is only 20% higher…

I agree that lowend salaries are comparable but presumably people working on a startup are earning anything but lowend.

The social benefits are only worthwhile when you are older (you should have done it the other way around :) ) and you are reminded of the administrative difficulties half the time you use them.

Mid-range food may be less expensive here but service is just terrible (well, not 100% of the time but it happens often enough to be really annoying).

I thought the AZERTY and QWERTY layouts were about the same if you touchtype. There should be a software option to switch it.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#253

Post by dest »

scrollaway wrote: post #190
dest wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have updated my original post to provide some sources. It gets slightly off topic and noticeably too political for HN, so maybe we should stop debating about this here.

I don't think this is off-topic. But you are completely off the mark. Health insurance: What you linked is an amendment that adds sanctions to illegally refusing social security coverage. Whether you think that's OK or not is irrelevant - it's not a speech issue. "saying you should not do abortion": You are grossly misrepresenting what that is. Abortion is considered an integral right for french women. What your link…

About state health insurance, this link should be clearer, despite not being an official source. People with more Google-fu than me can post other links if they wish.

http://www.agipi.com/espace-public/consulter-nos-experts/san...

"Depuis le 1er janvier 2007, des sanctions contre toute personne qui, par quelque moyen que ce soit, inciterait les assurés sociaux à ne plus s’affilier à un organisme de Sécurité sociale ou à ne plus payer leurs cotisations sont applicables. Elles prévoient, entre autre, une peine de six mois de prison et/ou une amende allant de 7 500 euros à 15 000 euros."

Translation: incitating people to have no health insurance at all can get you to jail (up to 6 months).

About abortion: http://www.20minutes.fr/societe/1931599-20160927-ivg-gouvern...

"Si l’amendement du gouvernement est voté, le délit d’entrave concernera désormais les sites qui véhiculent «des allégations ou une présentation faussée, pour induire en erreur dans un but dissuasif sur la nature et les conséquences d’une IVG»". If it is not limitation of freedom of speech, I think it is very close.

http://www.france24.com/fr/20161129-france-episcopat-proposi...

"Si le texte est voté, ces faits seront punis des mêmes peines que l’entrave physique à l’avortement ou à l’information sur l’avortement, soit deux ans de prison et 30 000 euros d’amende."

So presenting biased information about abortion (at least in the "wrong" direction) can get you to jail (up to 2 years). If my sources are correct, this proves my points.

PS: sorry for French quotes. Too lazy to fully translate them.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#254

Post by jchampem »

dmuneka wrote: post #240
jjawssd wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That sounds like double or triple the amount of tax Americans in a similar role have to pay at home

I think it depends on where in the US. In NYC, I pay around 32% of my gross income in federal and local taxes, social security, medicare, etc. That's almost 4 months of my salary. On top of that, I have to pay for health insurance, deductibles, and retirement savings, which I assume my French counterpart wouldn't have to separately pay for.

Exactly. The first 25% I mentioned includes health insurance for your whole family with close to 0 deductibles (usually a few euros here and there), retirement plan and unemployment insurance (if you get fired, you can expect to get ~60% of your previous gross salary the first year, slowly decreasing after that) and at the very least 5 weeks of paid annual leave.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#255

Post by CalRobert »

pyvpx wrote: post #138
kogepathic wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany offers a special visa for people who want to be self-employed. [0] Additionally, if you have a Bachelor/Master degree in STEM, you can easily get a Blue Card if you receive a contract paying over 50,800 EUR/year. [1] Lower salaries would still enable you to obtain a regular work visa (which is specific to the job title and company). I've heard Germany is a difficult country to establish a company (GmbH). I ca…

I moved to Berlin almost three years ago, and extended/expanded my company here. I am not a start-up, though I am developing a product, but more of a one-man consulting shop. Getting a self-employed VISA is not easy unless you have some serious credentials. My partner has three degrees, two post-graduate, from highly regarded US universities; an extensive profile of speaking engagements; a very, very solid financial…

A couple options:

If you want to self-employ and like the Netherlands: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DAFT

If you recently graduated or are still in school: Irish working holiday

I'm sure there are others, but those are what come to mind if you're an American who wants to live/work and Europe and you don't have a sponsor and aren't funded (if you have capital, you have far more options, of course).

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#257

Post by scrollaway »

omginternets wrote: post #237
scrollaway wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know Zemmour other than by name. So I went on his Wikipedia page to take a look at that. The french one appears to have more information. - Condamnation pour incitation à la discrimination raciale en 2011 - Condamnation pour provocation à la haine envers les musulmans - Condamnation d'I-Télé pour "rupture abusive de contrat" One is about racial discrimination. One is about inciting hate against muslims. The l…

The devil is in the details. What passes for "inciting *" is very broad, and is (in itself) the mechanism by which political censorship is applied. I truly urge you to read up on this affaire. What he actually said really wasn't that big a deal.

I can see how your general point about political censorship could be true (I don't know enough about this to pass judgement), but I'm asking specifically about your comment on homosexuals.

Just to recontextualize this: This is a thread about the viability of startups in France. As I mentioned a bit further up, there are "no hate speech" rules all over Europe. Germany for example is far, far stricter than France about it ... and Berlin has a vibrant startup scene.

I generally agree that "inciting" is a loosely defined term and I, too, dislike how easy of a tool it can be for political censorship. But there's worlds between those details and some of the claims I'm finding in this thread.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#258

Post by david927 »

javajosh wrote: post #160
esquevin wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'll definitely earn way less, but you'll be entitled to a lot of vacations (5~7 weeks of paid vacations). The Americans I know that went to work to France don't want to go back

So do the Americans like it in France and want to stay there? The wording of your comment makes it unclear.

I'm an American that just spent five years in France. My experience, for what it's worth: I can't say enough nice things about it in every aspect outside of work. I lived in the south of France and I now realize how nice life can be.

Life -- not work. Working there was a nightmare. The pay is low, and while you can live on it, you're not really saving. For a while I was part of the startup community there and while there are many great programs from the government, there is a bit of a local mafia deciding things. Investors were so unsophisticated that technology itself seemed to scare them.

All-in-all, if I could have made it work, I would have done so in a heartbeat. Living there is simply a small piece of heaven on earth. There's just no way to viably work there that I could find.

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#259

Post by omginternets »

scrollaway wrote: post #257
omginternets wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The devil is in the details. What passes for "inciting *" is very broad, and is (in itself) the mechanism by which political censorship is applied. I truly urge you to read up on this affaire. What he actually said really wasn't that big a deal.

I can see how your general point about political censorship could be true (I don't know enough about this to pass judgement), but I'm asking specifically about your comment on homosexuals. Just to recontextualize this: This is a thread about the viability of startups in France. As I mentioned a bit further up, there are "no hate speech" rules all over Europe. Germany for example is far, far stricter than France about…

Hmm we may have a misunderstanding. I didn't make a comment about homosexuals, specifically. My point was rather that there are, de facto, state-enforced standards for political correctness in France and that this maps directly onto a form of censorship.

Or am I still missing your point?

Re: A Visa for founders, engineers and investors willing to join France

#260

Post by CalRobert »

CalRobert wrote: post #255
pyvpx wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I moved to Berlin almost three years ago, and extended/expanded my company here. I am not a start-up, though I am developing a product, but more of a one-man consulting shop. Getting a self-employed VISA is not easy unless you have some serious credentials. My partner has three degrees, two post-graduate, from highly regarded US universities; an extensive profile of speaking engagements; a very, very solid financial…

A couple options: If you want to self-employ and like the Netherlands: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DAFT If you recently graduated or are still in school: Irish working holiday I'm sure there are others, but those are what come to mind if you're an American who wants to live/work and Europe and you don't have a sponsor and aren't funded (if you have capital, you have far more options, of course).

Also, note that if you _do_ get a Blue Card it lets you work in most of the EU

"..The Blue Card is an approved EU-wide work permit (Council Directive 2009/50/EC)[1] allowing high-skilled non-EU citizens to work and live in any country within the European Union, excluding Denmark, Ireland and the United Kingdom.."

Though that is subject to change depending on the political climate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Card_(European_Union)

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