Sunday, October 24, 2010

French Pension Reform

France has now passed a controversial pension reform bill that has led to massive strikes in France, paralyzing the entire country. This measure raises the retirement age from 60 to 62 and raises the pension age from 65 to 67. This measure intends to shrink the deficit of France and kick start the sluggish economy.

"Mr Sarkozy says the measure is necessary to reduce the deficit.

The government says the reform is needed to save the indebted pension system from collapse.

Unions say retirement at 60 is a hard-earned right and say the reform is unfair to workers."

FYI: The social security retirement age is 67.

2 comments:

  1. This is a very interesting article. I could not help but think how people are so stubborn about change in one direction for certain items. For example, in Economics we think of wages as sticky. No one complains when wages increase but they do everything they can to avoid a downward shift in wages. This article shows the same effect with retirement age. People resist an increase in retirement age, but would not complain about a decrease in retirement age.

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  2. I think the people don't want the change because they take those pension for grant, and if the law changes, it will affect their lives a lot.

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