According to Reuters:
"France braced for mass protests on Saturday against a new employment law as unions said more than 1 million people would march to increase pressure on the government to repeal the measure." (http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyid=2006-03-17T230956Z_01_L17342207_RTRUKOC_0_US-FRANCE.xml&rpc=22)
France is entering a period of economic reality. The party is over. The days of long vacations, job guarantees and the 35-hour work week are over. Socialism did not work in France either!
As Professor Thomas Sewell wrote this week:
"Like some other European Union countries, France has laws making it hard to fire anybody. The political left has long believed that such laws are a way of reducing unemployment.
"The right to a job is obviously not the same thing as a job. Otherwise there would not be a 23 percent unemployment rate among young French workers."
(http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2006/03/french_student_riots.html)
French politicians have been postponing the inevitable. They are now faced with angry young people who can't find work because no one is creating jobs in the sick French economy.
I found this article rather interesting:
"Anti-market rhetoric from French elites is partly to blame for the violent protests against reform that are wracking the country, Polish central bank Governor Leszek Balcerowicz said on Saturday.
"I think in France, most of the elite engage in anti-market propaganda for their short-term political purposes," he said at the 61st International Atlantic Economic Conference in Berlin.
"If you bombard the public with this message, which is derived from Marxism...then we should not be surprised" when there is public resistance to change, he added." (http://news.scotsman.com/latest_international.cfm?id=431542006&format=print)
French, as well as European elites, have indeed promoted a socialist theme. They've raised a generation of young people on the idea that they have rights and entitlements rather than duties and responsibilities.
France, Germany and Italy must deregulate labor laws to tackle their economic problems. Otherwise, more young people will be marching in the streets.
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