(TheNewAmerican) - Francois Hollande, the new socialist president of France, has a plan for solving his nation’s economic woes: raising taxes. Having already promised much higher taxes on the rich, he is now going to impose a 160-percent increase in the tax on beer. The European Union has already seen the beer industry decline by six percent in production since 2008 and by eight percent in consumption. The new French tax will affect not only local breweries but also imported beer, which constitutes 30 percent of the beer sold in France.