[ad_1]
After three weeks of violent demonstrations in France, President Emmanuel Macron faces the biggest crisis of his leadership. The protesters nicknamed "yellow vests" are demanding financial support from the government for large sections of the population who have difficulties in meeting their needs.
On Tuesday (4), the Prime Minister overthrew the policy that sparked the revolt. Edouard Philippe sought to appease the anger by suspending for six months the planned increase in the fuel tax. On Wednesday (5), the government yielded more and postponed the increase until the end of 2019.
But it is not clear whether this isolated concession will be enough to get protesters out of the streets.
whose participants wear or wear high visibility vests used in an emergency, have become a collective protest against the deeper problems that have raged for years in France: the decline in the standard of living and the erosion of power purchase price, which has worsened since the long-term financial crisis in Europe.
The result g is a figure that explains why France broke up.
1,700 euros: the average monthly income in France
Like other Western countries, there is a deep and growing disparity between the richest and poorest citizens in France. The richest 20% of the population earn nearly five times more than the poorest 20%.
The richest 1% of the French population represent more than 20% of the country's economic wealth. But the average monthly income available is around 1,700 euros (R $ 7,400). Half of French workers earn less than that.
Many "yellow vests" protest against the difficulty of paying rent, feeding their families and subsisting in the face of the rising cost of living – while household income is virtually unchanged.
French workers are in a better position than in Italy, where the real increase in wages is negative since 2016. In that country, real wages fell by 1.1% between 39, Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2016 and 2017,
Although real hourly wages have increased in France, this increase has been slow, especially since the end of the debt crisis. in the eurozone in 2012.
1.8%: economic growth
France is the third largest economy in Europe after the United Kingdom and Germany. of the world, before inflation is taken into account. Tourists who visit Paris today can return home with the impression that the brightness of the French capital makes the rest of the country live in such a favorable situation.
But economic growth has stagnated for nearly a decade during the long European debt crisis. , and only improved recently.
The quality of recovery has been uneven. Many permanent jobs have been lost, especially in rural areas and in former industrial areas. And many of the new jobs created are temporary and precarious contracts.
The growth of the economy is essential to improve the living conditions of those who demonstrate. However, while Macron's nascent economic recovery helped create jobs, growth slowed to 1.8% a year, as the rest of the region slowed down. euro.
More than 9%: unemployment
The unemployment rate in the country has stagnated between 9% and 11% since 2009, the year of the debt crisis in Europe. The index rose from 10.1% in the Macron election to 9.1% today. But it remains twice as important as that of Germany.
Macron attempts to inject new energy into the economy. This year, he has commissioned an aggressive review of rigid national labor laws to help companies define the rules of hiring and firing, so as to break with prevailing standards that dissuade employers from hiring new employees.
The measures also limit the ability of unions to postpone their adoption by allowing the negotiation of individual agreements between employers and employees at the company or category level.
These reforms have helped attract companies such as Facebook and Google to France, but can take years to show positive results for most workers. And they have been repudiated by the workers, who see them as a plot to rob them of hard-won labor rights, favoring big business.
As part of its economic stimulus package, in its first year in power, Macron reduced taxes for the wealthiest taxpayers, including creating a single tax on capital income
. The central element of the tax package, precisely the most repudiated by the protesters, ended the wealth tax that hit many of the wealthiest families in the country. for a tax levied only on their real estate holdings.
Thus, revenue collected by the state this year decreased by 3.2 billion euros (about 14 billion rand).
Up to now, there is no reason to think that this cut had a stimulating effect. Macron has instead earned a reputation for favoring the rich, which is one of the main reasons for the anger shown by the "yellow jackets".
While high-income earners enjoy tax incentives, according to Macron's tax plan, their purchasing power 5% of the country's poorest families declined last year. But, according to the French Economic Observatory, the majority of the 70% of the population is neither beneficiary nor disadvantaged.
715 billion euros: the social safety net
The "yellow jackets" have the support of three quarters of the population, it remains to be seen how much the protesters really suffer – or to what extent their explosion can be attributed to a secular culture of public protest against change.
citizens with one of the most generous social safety nets in the world, to the point that more than a third of their economic output is used for social protection, more than in n & # 39; 39 any other European country.
EUR 715 billion (3.1 billion rubles) with, inter alia, health care, family allowances and unemployment insurance.
To qualify for this help, French workers pay some of the highest taxes in Europe
Although high-income people pay more taxes, the country also applies a tax to the added value of 20% on most goods and services. Added to fuel taxes, which the Macron government has just promised to suspend temporarily, such measures tend to hurt the poor, while the rich are virtually unaffected.
Source link
