Bernard Arnault is packing a fiscal parachute. If he decides to leap out of the French plane, with a Belgian passport, he will have all the necessary elements to properly leave the French tax system.If France decides to tax based on citizenship (like the US) then he has another passport in place so he will not be stateless. He can also give up his French passport, so that he will only have a Belgian one and thereby properly have left the French tax regime under the France-Belgian tax treaty. With the French tax system in a high likelihood of hitting him hard, this is just smart self-protection. As for French politicians, as Samuel Johnson famously said, "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel". As for those people who say "good riddance", I would point out to you that a progressive tax system like that of France, the US and the UK has the natural result that the top 1% of tax payers contribute over 30% of the personal tax revenue collected. Therefore, losing a super-contributor like Mr. Arnault would have a huge negative asymmetric impact on tax revenues. Before you call him names (which is not going to inspire him to stay), you may want to think about how you are going to replace the 10s of millions in annual tax revenue he provides.