“I won’t be moving to France…”

Suit yourself! (*GRIN*) (I hear the baguettes are to DIE for though!)

“I’m not saying France is utopia…”

I know. We both realize there is no “utopia” for the average person. (Give me a few hundred million dollars though and I’ll be able to create my own personal utopia anywhere in the world – from the richest country to the poorest.) (*WINK*)

BILL

……….And that’s one of the reasons why I like it……..And I’ve never had to wait 20 minutes at Carrefour as you describe…….Actually France is one of the most well run countries in the world…..if you strip out all the asset bubble growth numbers of the last eight years their growth was basically the same as ours……and they have been the least affected western economy by the bubble bursting……..there are also studies showing the US to be a less socially mobile country than the US…….I lived in France for four years and Britain about eight at two separate times……Both great…..both societies have neuroses of various sorts but nowhere near as bad as here and they are much more sceptical and basically happy I suppose(compare the atmosphere in an English pub with an American bar in middle America) or so it seemed to me

I read the comment you mentioned and followed the link to his website which had a long and somewhat justified rant at the EU. I’m not living in France but I know that even during the ‘boom’, people in Britain were making some of the same complaints. The 68ers aren’t the real problem, the whole generation is. Social mobility is suffering everywhere because the post war generations have the good jobs and are living longer. Basically I’m not saying France is utopia because it clearly isn’t but I think the numbers seem to prove you can have certain social programmes and regulations without taking a hit on growth or quality of life.

………..A night at the theater in nyc and a very expensive dinner with she who must be obeyed…….Reinhoudt is spinning……….basically the Europeans have healthcare systems that cost 7- 10% of GDP…….there are different models but even when the paying side of the system is ostensibly to a large extent private as in France, the govt is in total control of them in reality………. they cover everyone and by and large work very efficiently……I’ve been treated in two of them…….sure they have cost problems but on nothing like the scale we do ……..and no serious politician would ever suggest eliminating or substantially changing them……..he’s also exaggerating grossly the American budgetary problems which are entirely fixable……..the CBO numbers he quotes are totally worthless…….government expenditures reaching 42% of GDP by 2050……that’s 41 years away………govt economists couldn’t predict that the US economy was in serious trouble 18 months before it fell off a cliff!……..this is for the birds.

Right back at you; thanks for posting the links you did.

The April ‘07 Le Monde article is particularly interesting. It sounds to me like you should move to France, Dacook! (*GRIN*)

Seriously… the piece was interesting. Still, as I’m sure you noted, it was effectively a piece of anti-Sarkozy campaign literature – a shot across the bow of the Sarkozy campaign’s portrayal of the economic situation in France at the time.

I’d be interested in getting reading a critical review of the piece by someone qualified to do so. Quite frankly I don’t have the requisite knowledge of the nuts and bolts of the French economic system to “argue” with what I read or the conclusions.

Dacook. We’re going back and forth in good faith, right? (*SMILE*) Did you scroll down the comments attached to the article in question? Go back to the article… start scrolling… right around the middle you’ll find a post titled, “France is inded in decline,” submitted by skovgaard on Fri May 4th, 2007 at 08:32:04 PM EST.

As previously noted, I’m not an expert on France. (*SMILE*) I do know about the “‘68′ers” though and am familiar with the social/intellectual stratification of the French civil service and the linkage between “the Academy” and government and business as well. (Skull & Bones has nothing on these cats!) (*GRIN*) (Hell… the Brits are pikers at putting the “C” into “Class” when it comes to the way the French civil service moves their folks up the ladder…)

Anyway… bottom line… between the two of us we’ve hopefully exposed our fellow posters to interesting and useful information that might impact the way they think about issues such as the proper role of government, how much is too much, how much isn’t enough, etc.

BILL

The second is that chronic high French unemployment is a myth. The French include students and other groups in their stats that other countries do not. I heard an interview by Jerome Guillet, article here, claiming that if you took out the top 0.1% of earners from GDP, growth in France is higher than the UK and US, benefiting the middle class. It’s worth reading.