Around 4.8 million people in France are now considered wealthy, according to a new report – so exactly how much money do you need to be considered officially rich?
Determining who is rich in France is not always straightforward. Income tax data can provide some clues but tax secrecy rules mean only average figures are publicly available at local authority level, and one single high-earning household can widely change the picture.
A new report from the French charity l’Observatoire des Inégalités (Observatory of Inequalities), published on June 2nd, offers a clearer view of wealth in France. Based on data from INSEE, France’s national statistics agency, the study finds that while the number of wealthy people has fallen slightly since 2010, the incomes and fortunes of the richest households continue to grow.
The report estimates that 4.8 million people out of France’s population of 69 million can be classified as wealthy, which is around seven percent of the population.
How are wealthy people defined?
The study’s authors, Anne Brunner and Louis Maurin, define wealthy people as those whose standard of living after tax is at least double the national median. This means earning at least €4,292 per month for a single person, €6,438 for a childless couple, or €10,730 for a couple with two teenage children.
For comparison, the median monthly income stands at €2,146 for a single person, €3,219 for a couple without children and €5,365 for a couple with two teenagers.
Assets
Another way to assess wealth is to look at household assets, which include property and investments.
According to the study, 3.4 million people – around 11 percent of the French population – own assets worth more than €820,400. By comparison, the median gross wealth of French households is €205,100.
The report notes that households generally need assets of around €1 million to be considered genuinely wealthy, meaning that 6.5 percent of French households qualify.
However, only 0.6 percent of households pay France’s Impôt sur la Fortune Immobilière (IFI), the property wealth tax.
This relatively small proportion is explained by the tax’s high threshold. IFI applies only to households with net taxable property assets exceeding €1.3 million after deductions such as outstanding mortgages and renovation costs. As a result, many homeowners – even those living in expensive areas – do not pay the tax.
The report also highlights the concentration of wealth among a very small number of families. For example, it notes that the fortune of the luxury brand Hermès family alone exceeds the total value of all residential property in Marseille.
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Wealth concentration in Paris
Geography, age and gender also play a role in determining who belongs to France’s wealthiest groups.
More than a third (35 percent) of wealthy people live in the Paris metropolitan area, where many of France’s largest companies and government institutions are based.
Despite the capital’s high property prices, wealthy Parisians typically live in homes that are around 30 percent larger than the national average. The gap is even wider in other regions.
The report also finds that wealth increases with age. Nearly three-quarters (73 percent) of wealthy people are over the age of 45.
Among those still working, senior executives dominate, accounting for 74 percent of wealthy workers in both the private and public sectors. Business owners represent a further 13 percent.
Gender disparities are also evident, with women becoming increasingly underrepresented at the highest levels of income and wealth.
Inequality growing
The report concludes that wealth inequality continues to widen in France.
Since 1996, the standard of living of the country’s wealthiest households has increased by 40 percent, which is twice the rate recorded among the poorest 10 percent of the population.
Meanwhile, the combined wealth of France’s 500 richest individuals has increased 6.6-fold over the past two decades, underlining the growing concentration of wealth at the top of French society.
