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Here's a bit about France, where I live.

Anyone considering coming here - well you'd be mad not to want to live here really - beautiful scenery, no traffic jams outside of Paris and the turnaround weekends during national holidays - fabulous weather and great food. Really a winning combination.

But the absolute nightmare that most francophiles do not know about is TAX. In fact TAX is not really an issue, the French tax the holy cow's dung out of you in social charges before you even get to tax.

If you want to be self-employed in France it's easier now with the 'auto-entrepreneur' fiscal regime.

Beware lest the sunny climes, rolling hills, world class surf, spectacular mountains etc. etc. etc. deceive you.

My brother-in-law earns at least 900 euros a day and works constantly - well you'd think he'd be well off. Ha, what a joke! You don't know France and the French government. Why else is the black economy so HUGE here?

In fact you can earn more on the dole, if you have enough kids, than you can trying to work.

So if you are planning to teach in France, for heaven's sake look into it first and NEVER give up your citizenship from your own country.

For example there is a wealth tax here which has forced these fishermen in Brittany to sell their homes. If your net worth is over a certain amount you have to pay a percentage of that to the government each year in wealth tax. Now this net worth includes your main home. Consequently there are plenty of people out there scraping the pennies together to get in their weekly shopping, but who happen to live in old family homes they inherited which are worth a lot because of the rise in property prices across Europe, who have to sell up just to be able to pay the wealth tax.

Well I think that's enough on that topic!