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How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

christianpetroske.com

61–70 of 209 posts

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#61

Honestly, this reads as those books titled "How to make money selling books on Amazon". Living in France, I can tell, France is very startup hostile. The amount of taxes a company has to pay and the amount of paperwork to do (or money to delegate it) is just absurd. The only way a small tech company can make any money and be sustainable (let alone grow) is having all employees as associates (with all the organization…

Yes, default rates are quite high in France, but there are also subsides : JEI (jeune entreprise innovante), CIR (credit impot recherche) and CII (crédit impot innovation) and surrely others that can give you back a huge part of the taxes you pay. It's a PITA to fill, it keeps civil servants busy but hey, it can bring you tax and cotisations sociales (retirement / health) very low !!

Reducing taxes is not a subsidy...

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#62
post #29

Please write a blog post with a more complete list of podcasts that you listen to and sites that you read! It turns out it is surprisingly difficult to find pointers to sites and podcasts if you speak French, but do not live in France. The internet is really good at keeping us in our bubbles, making a lot of assumptions on geolocated IPs. As a side note, I will add that there is one thing that is somewhat problematic…

> The internet is really good at keeping us in our bubbles, making a lot of assumptions on geolocated IPs.

PocketCast, and I assume a lot of other podcast apps, let you change your country in the settings when you are browsing for new podcasts to listen.

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#63
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> not half of the salary More than half if you consider taxes on the company. A 30k salary costs the company about 80k. Sure, there are loads of social services, but still. In the company I created we did the work ourselves, and sometimes hired freelancers for certain things we're not familiar/experts in, but without external funding taking one single employee is a major blow to the accouting of a small company. With…

I’m sorry but no: a 30k salary does not cost the company 80k! It costs around 41k, or 49k if you take into account employee taxes (here is a simulator from the French government: https://entreprise.pole-emploi.fr/cout-salarie/ ). « Comité d’entreprise » are for 50+ employees and not 20. What’s the use in throwing around fake numbers just to make your point? Even if that sure must be a nice place to live, that is the…

I just use the link you have provided, if you fill the last field (net salary after tax, what is really paid to the bank account of the employee) to 30k/year, the total cost for employer is 57,950€. And not 41k like you mentioned

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#64

Honestly, this reads as those books titled "How to make money selling books on Amazon". Living in France, I can tell, France is very startup hostile. The amount of taxes a company has to pay and the amount of paperwork to do (or money to delegate it) is just absurd. The only way a small tech company can make any money and be sustainable (let alone grow) is having all employees as associates (with all the organization…

French here. This is very true. The whole economic incentives are made for big CAC40 companies whose owners/CEO are friends with the lawmakers. The small and medium companies, as individuals, are the most taxed out there. If you own a company and paid yourself you had to pass through 4 layers or so of taxation. > Financial and investing groups in France are very conservative. A friend set up a company, like you said…

Same in Germany, unless you hire full time lawyers and accountants you’ll end up burning a lot of money on these services, mistakes they make and all sorts of authorities.

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#65
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet hundreds of companies are created every year. You just illustrate the tipical French mentality ingrained by media all year long. A comment full of cliché. If France is so bad, move out. You'll learn a thing or two in the process. Beginning with the grass is not always greener elsewhere.

Yet hundreds of companies die, too. > You just illustrate the tipical French mentality ingrained by media all year long. Living in France for 8 years and creating 2 companies doesn't seem to count, eh? Now I have my companies elsewhere in Europe and just pay my taxes on the revenues in France, only not to deal with the bureaucratic overhead. > If France is so bad, move out. The chauvinism is strong in this one. I'm i…

> Yet hundreds of companies die, too.

Like everywhere in the world.

I do not mind argumented criticism. But you are making broad subjectives statements that we ear ALL the time. If France was such an hostile place to business, it would not be the 7th largest economy in the world (2019).

>> If France is so bad, move out. > The chauvinism is strong in this one.

I could answer in bad faith that cultural imperial is also strong and that one need to learn the culture of the country one lives in as they will not find "silicon valley" culutre everywhere.

But really it was not my point. My point is I'm fed up with people painting such a dark picture of France. Most of the critism are way too often resumed to, I want the cake and eat it too, the quality of life but not the bureaucracy and taxes. It gets old fast.

> > You'll learn a thing or two in the process. > I'm sure I would. I mean, I've done it.

And it looks like you even pick up the French national sport I'm no stranger to: whining. (tone: light hearted joke, not personal attack to be clear)

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#66
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet hundreds of companies die, too. > You just illustrate the tipical French mentality ingrained by media all year long. Living in France for 8 years and creating 2 companies doesn't seem to count, eh? Now I have my companies elsewhere in Europe and just pay my taxes on the revenues in France, only not to deal with the bureaucratic overhead. > If France is so bad, move out. The chauvinism is strong in this one. I'm i…

> because I like things here Do you think it would stay the same without all the regulations you love to hate ? You can't complain about paying taxes and at the same time say you love France, 80% of the things that makes France a good country to live in are financed by taxes one way or another. Just look over the pond if you want to see how France would look without regulations, 1930 France is today's US in term of w…

It's not an all or nothing situation. GP is likely not opposed to each and every regulation and would like to see them all, 100%, go.

They pay taxes in France, it's only natural to want to have a say in how this money is spent. Complaining against the way things are doesn't mean that they would want each and every regulation repealed and switch completely to the way things are "over the pond". It could, it probably doesn't. They probably would have gone over the pond if it were the case.

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#67
post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> not half of the salary More than half if you consider taxes on the company. A 30k salary costs the company about 80k. Sure, there are loads of social services, but still. In the company I created we did the work ourselves, and sometimes hired freelancers for certain things we're not familiar/experts in, but without external funding taking one single employee is a major blow to the accouting of a small company. With…

I’m sorry but no: a 30k salary does not cost the company 80k! It costs around 41k, or 49k if you take into account employee taxes (here is a simulator from the French government: https://entreprise.pole-emploi.fr/cout-salarie/ ). « Comité d’entreprise » are for 50+ employees and not 20. What’s the use in throwing around fake numbers just to make your point? Even if that sure must be a nice place to live, that is the…

From what I heard France has strong worker protection laws, even stronger than Germany. Do you think this is/could be a problem for startups?

I am absolutely against the US way of just firing people, but I accept the realism of small businesses and startups where you -as en employee- simply can't take for granted that your job (or company) will exist in 5 or even 2-3 years.

IIRC in Germany we have exceptions for <10 employees, for example.

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#68
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you have to pay a separate fee (~200eur) this number is incorrect , or you get fooled, I was working in a startup that was exactly helping people creating companies with the paperwork, including the step you're mentionning, and it was 20 to 30 euros , maybe 50 depending on the journal and option you take 200~300 euros was the price we billed for a startup creation including ALL the paperwork, admnistrative fee, pub…

One source: https://www.entreprises-et-droit.fr/annonce-legale-creation-... Maybe did your company have a bulk pricing? Often, companies that offer "registration as a service" have a 200eur fee that excludes that kind of administrative fees. But 30eur for the announcement? Never seen that.

https://www.economie.gouv.fr/entreprises/publier-annonce-leg...

4,16€ / line.

Re: How I got the French Tech Visa to start my company in France

#70

From what a few of my colleagues told me: France is very racist. Apparently this is true in most of Europe. Everything looks okay on the surface but they are deep racial undertones. They tell me that believe it or not America is the one of the least racist countries. It does not mean there’s no racism in America just that it’s lesser. It’s easy for immigrants to assimilate into society in America than most places in…

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