Wednesday, April 05, 2006

French Bread

It is difficult, at times, to understand the frustrations and fears of people living in another country. Those outside the US sometimes presume that those of us here are all militant, gun-toting, bible-thumping imperialists while those in the US often presume those outside have no idea how to defend themselves, that they are professional victims or are hopelessly backward and provincial.

Premier in the public consciousness is the fact that once again, French streets are awash in humanity decrying some injustice many of us are not quite clear on.

What most Americans know (or seem to know):

  • French students are protesting a law allowing them to be fired without cause.
Okay, that's really about the extent of what most of us here understand.

So I thought, "Let's find out what they're upset about." I embarked upon many readings and one of the first things I noted was the terrible coverage CNN gave it. More and more that place is best for soundbites, it seems.

So off I flew to places like Open Democracy, the BBC, and even the Brussels Journal. What I read in these places was eye-opening in many ways, not least of which was the French protest. Maybe I'll discuss some of my other discoveries later.

The first thing I learned is that France has a very protectionist attitude about its workers. It is difficult to fire them and they are compensated heavily if they are terminated. This protectionism is widely seen as one of the primary contributing causes to French unemployment which by some accounts is nearly 10% among the general populace and said by some sources to be higher than 20% among its youth. Employers are unwilling to hire indiscriminately for fear of having a layabout for life. This is both reasonable and understandable.

After last year's riots, legislation was pushed through that allows employers to fire without cause any employee under 26, within their first two years of employment, and on their first job. Looking at a synopsis like this, as a US citizen, the initial reaction will be one of astonishment. After all, it gets progressively harder to fire them during their two-year trial and they get some small compensation when they're fired. There are more details but that's really what's salient.

My first reaction was, "Cry more. In the United States that's fairly normal. Go back to your state-paid education and quit whining." I was certain that it was just spoiled French kids without any proper perspective. In an environment like the US, compensation for being fired is unheard of outside layoffs and executive ousters.

Confident I'd figured it all out, I sat back and skimmed. But the more I read the more I realized it wasn't that simple, and that they weren't just whining.

The very nature of their job market is what's at stake here, not just young adults complaining that life isn't fair. If an under-26 is easy to fire, why bother with a potentially experienced worker who may have lousy work habits (after all, he or she is seeking a job post-26 so they must have been fired at some point, right?) when you can have what, in France, amounts to a disposable worker?

This means that young French workers have little of the security their older counterpars have, while also facing a market after firing where they will compete with their disposable erstwhile peers.

Granted, there is a fair bit of speculation here, and the slippery slope of logical fallacy lurks at the edges, but were I an employer in France these are thoughts I would have about my options concerning employees.

In France, unlike in the United States, workers have a lot of guarantees as an assumption of their job market. These are guarantees almost no US worker enjoys, so when a US citizen looks at the protests, it is very easy to assume that the French youth are spoiled brats looking for free money. But what some of us are missing is that, in France, what they are asking for is nothing short of the status quo. It would be like the US youth (we'll assume 18-26) protesting over the denial of access to a job based on their age. We don't tolerate that here and the French shouldn't tolerate what amounts to age-discrimination either.

Context is important. It is crucial to understanding, tolerance, and acceptance. This doesn't mean there are no absolutes at all, but that our experience is rarely the experience of those halfway around the globe and it becomes us to attempt understanding before rendering judgment.

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