« Blawg Review #137 -- Blawg Review in Paradiso | Main | Early Winter »
December 03, 2007
Sarkozy to France: Get off your derriere and back to work.
Speaking of picket lines and protests, nearly 19 million French viewers heard words to this effect in a televised interview on Thursday. WAC? still loves Paris above all places and the French above all Europeans. However, and as we've suggested, it's high time for the French--the West's high-minded guardians of culture, conscience and taste--to start working again. Between 1901 and 2002, the French (population about 60 million) won 44 Nobel prizes, fourth behind the US (pop. 287 million), UK (60 million) and Germany (83 million). Why not excel once again in the world's marketplaces as well? Begin by chucking the 35-hour work week, a madness the French president thinks is killing the country. So in Saturday's Financial Times, see "Sarkozy Urges France to Work Harder", and for a list of President Sarkozy's specific proposals, designed in large part to increase French consumer purchasing power, see Reuters.
Posted by JD Hull at December 3, 2007 11:06 PM
Comments
I have heard it said that the French worker has a higher productivity level than other Europeans. One wonders therefore, if true, if this is in spite of or because of the 35 hour week? Would forcing the Cheese Eating Surrender Moneys to take on WAC? associate working hours double their output? Or would they just become demoralised and slump to the level of other European (& US?) countries.
They'd then be equally unproductive and have no life or any time to exercise the culture and taste you so admire?
Might they not degenerate into America-Lite? i.e. the English.
Posted by: Geeklawyer at December 2, 2007 03:09 AM