Another Socialist Failure

As of January 1, 2008, 64,473,140 people lived in the French Republic. 61,875,822 of these lived in metropolitan France, whereas 2,597,318 lived in the French overseas departments and territories. France has a sizeable population of Arabs and Africans from its former colonies, the proportion of immigrants in France is on par with other European nations such as the United Kingdom (8%), Germany (9%), the Netherlands (18%), Sweden (13%) and Switzerland (19%). Outside of Europe and North Africa, the highest rate of immigration is from Vietnam, Cambodia and Senegal. The large-scale immigration from Islamic countries sparked controversy in France, as some demographers state "the third world Neo-colonization of Europe" might make France an "outpost of the Arab world". Maybe that's why Paris is Burning? On the other hand, over one million Afro-French (or "black French"), descendants of sub-Saharan African and West Indian immigrants, have enjoyed better cultural and social integration, though some have dealt with issues of racism in French society. Widespread opposition to labor reform has in recent years hampered the government's ability to revitalize the economy. In 2007, the government launched divisive labor reform efforts that will continue into 2008. France's tax burden remains one of the highest in Europe (nearly 50% of GDP in 2005). France brought the budget deficit within the eurozone's 3%-of-GDP limit for the first time in 2007 and has reduced unemployment to roughly 8%. The 35-hour working week was a measure adopted first in France, in February 2000, the main stated objectives of the law were two-fold:   To reduce unemployment and yield a better division of labor, in a context where some people work long hours while some others are unemployed. A 10.2% decrease in the hours extracted from each worker would, theoretically, require firms to hire correspondingly more workers, a remedy for unemployment. To take advantage of improvements in productivity of modern society in order to give workers some more personal time in order to enhance their quality of life. That doesn't seem to have been the case, like most Socialist programs where the Utopians calculate a free ride in all social needs it hasn't quite worked out that well, their labor unions are like our labor unions, they want the deep pockets of the employer to bear the burden of the Socialist programs and at the same time salve the employees grievances of being over worked. That's the answer, reduce the workweek, give more paid vacations to the workers and hold those wages artificially high. Seems that there has been an economic change of heart, and the French parliament was set Wednesday to adopt a major economic reform promised by President Nicolas Sarkozy, which amounts to a defacto end to the country's much disputed 35-hour working week. Wow, have they finally figured out that their nation has to compete in a global market? French senators have already adopted other key reforms which change rules on strikes, tighten criteria for unemployment payments, and free up the economy with plans aimed at bringing down the cost of living by boosting competition. Competition, a novel approach to solving their slumping economy and high unemployment rate. The new measures were approved by the National Assembly lower house earlier in July and will become law with the backing of the Senate, where Sarkozy's right-wing UMP party has a majority. Who is opposing the new measures? The reform most contested by the opposition Socialists and by trades unions is the move to let companies ditch the 35-hour work week, a measure brought in by a Socialist government 10 years ago and denounced by conservatives as a drag on France's competitivity. This reminds me of my last ten years at the company I worked for, my department in maintenance was taken over by the production department as a move to reduce duplicate management, the production department needed the skilled labor but never entered us into their operating budget, only budgeting for their operators. Our funding as well as that of outside labor was managed as cost overruns to the operations budget. No matter what we did to cut costs it was impossible to balance the budget, that didn't stop management from using that as a cudgel to beat us over the head. Overtime, we were held to an 80 hour week in a possible 168 hour 7 day time frame per shift, they wouldn't hire new help to cover the shortages, we worked a lot of overtime, especially on 14 day shifts, I personally have worked over 128 hours in one 7 day shift, that gets expensive for the company in two ways, employee burnout and the lack of new trainees. The company was stepping over dollars to save penny's, that last ten years was hell on earth, I left four years before the company folded. Labor costs are the first thing a company cuts to save money, but limiting hours usually costs more, the only true savings for the corporation is that they base retirement benefits on the standard work week, in our case it's based on and limited to 40 hours, overtime doesn't accrue. France not only carries the health and retirement benefits costs it also carries the health costs and the unemployment stipends, if you can't compete on the global market the entire Socialist infrastructure collapses. This is the promise of change we are being sold, just look at Canada and Europe for the results of that change. The future French law would maintain the working week at 35 hours but give businesses the right to negotiate directly with employees to decide their working hours. While the 35-hour week was aimed at cutting unemployment and the French statistics institute INSEE said it created 350,000 new jobs between 1998 and 2002, but at the cost of billions of euros in state aid to companies. The bill concerning the unemployed which passed the French Senate Wednesday night obliges job seekers to accept the third "reasonable" job offer made to them, failing which their unemployment benefits would be stopped. That should piss off the Labor Unions, another controversial measure approved by senators forces schools to look after children in school premises when teachers are on strike. It also obliges workers to hold "preliminary negotiations" with employers before launching strike action. Critics(Unions) say the law undermines the right to strike. Sarkozy announced the proposed reform on 15 May, the day of national education mobilization to protest against cutting 11,200 positions at the start of the next school term. After their accusation that Americans are lazy and non productive I see it as a step in the right direction for France but you can bet your sweet ass I'm not going out and buy some French Brie and Champagne.