French Workers Refuse to be “Kleenex”

Was it only three years ago that some of our puffed up patriots were denouncing the French as “cheese-eating surrender monkeys,” too fattened on Camembert to stub out their Galois’s and get down with the war on Iraq? Well, take another look at the folks who invented the word liberté. For more than a week now they’ve been marching, rioting, and burning up cars to preserve a right Americans can only dream of: the right not to be fired at an employer’s whim.

The French government’s rationale for its new labor law was economically impeccable, as economic reasoning goes these days: Make it easier for employers to fire people and they will be more eager to hire people, thus reducing France’s appalling unemployment rate of 9.6 percent. Furthermore, the law will apply only to people under 26, and the terminations can occur only during the first two years of employment. So why is Paris burning?

Maybe the rioters sense a logical fallacy in the government’s proposal: Fire more people so more people can be hired? What corporations call “flexibility” – the right to dispose of workers at will – is what workers experience as disposability, not to mention insecurity and poverty. The French students who are tossing Molotov cocktails don’t want to become what they call “a Kleenex generation” – used and tossed away when the employer decides he needs a fresh one.

You may recognize in the French government’s reasoning the same arguments Americans hear whenever we raise a timid plea for a higher minimum wage or a halt to the steady erosion of pensions and health benefits: What? – scream the economists who flack for the employing class – if you do anything, anything at all, to offend or discomfit the employers they will respond by churlishly failing to employ you! Unemployment will rise, and you – lacking of course the health care and other benefits provided by the French welfare state – will quickly spiral down into starvation.

French youth aren’t buying this kind of argument, probably because they know where the “Anglo-Saxon model,” as they call it, leads. If you have to give up job security to get a job, what next? Will the pampered employers be inspired to demand a suspension of health and safety regulations? Will they start requiring their workers to polish their shoes while hand-feeding them hot-buttered croissants? Non to all that, the French kids are saying. We only have to look to America – or for that matter, China -- to see where that leads.

Of course the French aren’t entirely fair in calling their nemesis the “Anglo-Saxon model.” It’s the specifically American model they have to fear. Last week I was in England, ancestral home of the Anglo-Saxon race, talking about Bait and Switch, when a fellow in the audience asked me how people could be fired without “due process.” For a moment I thought I had misheard or been misled by one of those incomprehensibly quaint English regional dialects. But no, in the U.K. a person who feels she has been wrongfully dismissed can turn to an Employment Appeals Tribunal and, beyond that, to the courts. I had to explain that in the U.S., you can be fired for just about anything: Having a “bad attitude,” which can mean having a funny look on your face. Or just turning out to be “not a good fit.”

Years ago, there was a theory on the American left which someone– maybe it was me – termed Worsism: the worse things get, the more likely people will be to rise up and demand their rights. But in America at least, it doesn’t seem to work that way. The worse things get, the harder it becomes to even imagine any kind of resistance. The fact that you can be fired “at will” – the will of the employer, that is – freezes employees into terrified obedience. Add to that the fact that job loss is accompanied by a loss of access to health care, and you get a kind of captive mentality bordering on the kinkily masochistic: Beat me, insult me, double my workload, but please don’t set me free!

Far be it from me, as a responsible blogger, to advocate the burning of cars and smashing of store windows. But why are American students sucking their thumbs while the Bush administration proposes a $12.7 billion cut in student loans? Where is the outrage over the massive lay-offs at Ford, Hewlett Packard, and dozens of other major companies? And is the poverty-stricken quarter of the population too stressed by their mounting bills and multiple jobs to protest cuts in Medicaid and already pathetic housing subsidies?

Compared to those “surrender monkeys,” we’re looking like a lot of soggy used Kleenex.

Comments

[Victoria]

I have a few questions that may make one question the supposed inethicality of firing...

If a company wants to lay off workers in order to increase efficiency, but does not do so, either because such an action would be against the law or because the company feels an obligation to the workers, won't the cost of inefficiency simply be passed on to consumers? Now, let us suppose that this particular company in question is an American company, and it faces two choices: either increase efficiency(supposing layoffs are not against the law) by laying off these workers, or loose out to foreign competition, consequentially threatening the job security of even more workers at that company, as the company may have to close or outsource their labor(you seem to treat outsourcing as criminally as you do layoffs, so this presents a prickly dilemma. Would you consider it incorrect to lay those workers off, understanding that by doing so, the jobs of many more workers may be saved? Wouldn't all the workers in this situation suffer more if there was a blanket policy employed to prevent all layoffs...

Also, I'd like to know how exactly you suggest America handles terminations. Do you suggest we create an Employment Board, so that unjust terminations may be reconciled? Do employers have any say in this process(the creation of the board), or are they excluded from a role in deciding the fate of their businessess? Are employees permitted to take a case to such a board without producing evidence of their unjust termination beforehand, or can an employee drag his or her empoyer into the courtoom, having accused the employer of unjust termination, thus causing the employer to loose valueble time needed to run his or her business? Certainly, such a system does present disincentives to hiring; if it becomes virtually impossible to fire a worker, as such a process requires red tape and time, employers will be much more wary of and hesitant towards hiring, as they will not be able to terminate even a bad worker with alacrity. Or, say the firing was necessary simply because an economic condition required the employer to cut down production. The employer decides to terminate the most recently hired employee, as he's the most inexperienced. Couldn't this employee simply petition the board and skew the case, thus arguing he was fired for his lack of seniority?

How exactly do the current French labor laws work? Are any terminations allowed to occur? Perhaps it is difficult to accurately convey the magnitude of change without first establishing the conditions that exist beforehand.

[dearkitty]

More on the mass actions in France, with 28 March as big strike day, at http://dearkitty.modblog.com/?show=blogview&blog_id=814498

[John]

It seems to me that if an employee has the right to terminate his or her employment 'at will' then an employer should have the same right.
The problem in America (and France apparently) is the lack of quality job opportunities. If jobs were plentiful, the shoe were on the other foot as it were, there would be no notion toward a 'due process' to govern or regulate an employer.
The French are frustrated with their state of affairs and are reacting consistent with their philosophy, which is a measure more rebellious than ours in America.
America is experiencing a down time with respect to employment which is further exacerbated by increasing diversity in pay levels, health care costs, and fighting a war that has lost its moral legitimacy.
Practical solutions include raising the minimum wage, employment insurance reform, a universal health care program, and of course, developing a more effective foreign policy.
These are not new ideas. Some, the universal health care program for instance, have been visited before and rejected. However, the problem of escalating health care costs has not gone away either.
Americans, in my view, can be most activist by joining the debate. Blog, write your representative, send a letter to your local newspaper, carry a sign in the street, or whatever makes sense.
But do not resort to anarchy. Burning cars and smashing windows will not solve problems. Progressive reforms in key areas of government will and are very achievable with political pressure.

[high5]

Victoria. People can be fired in France and in other countries with superior than US labor protection laws. That is, if there is a valid reason for the layoff. One such valid reason is that there isn't enough work, a situation which might have occured due to investments in more efficient processes. You're putting up a strawman.
What the protests in France is about is that the proposed new law will give employers the right to fire anyone without reason.

[Hattie]

Too many Americans still believe that somehow, some way, they are going to get a chance at the big prizes, that they are going to be capitalists just like Donald Trump.We are taught to look up to people with lots of money and to want to be like them. As long as this is the case, we'll let ourselves be jerked around in the job market.
The French know better. Unlike us, they have a viable working class and the mentality that goes with that. They do not make common cause with capitalists but rightly consider them to be exploiters of resources and labor.
Here's a little everyday story: my husband just lost another job so we have been hustling around getting medical coverage. This should not be happening to us. We have paid into an insurance plan for several years and now they're just yanking it. That means a profit for them and nothing for us. That stinks.
By the way, my husband is not a bum but rather a Ph.D research scientist with a substantial repution. Makes no difference to Joe Bottom Line Capitalist who does not want to pay for our medical coverage. As far as J.C. is concerned, my husband is just another superflous employee. Luckily, my husband has used his brain power to get enough return on the wealth he has created for others so that we can live decently if not opulently even without the job. But that's only because he's insisted on getting a share of his intellectual property, with the help of lawyers. Otherwise we could just struggle in our old age, and Joe Capitalist would not give a rip.
Hey, the French are smart.

[Sharon]

Hattie, isn't he eligible for COBRA? I was laid off last year, but found another job within a couple of months. Trouble was, it was 70+ miles from home. I quit in Novemeber and am now working part-time and going to graduate school. My COBRA costs over $500/mo. If I hadn't taken the last job, my COBRA would be about $300. But it would have run out by now. It's a crappy system.

[Victoria]

I'm sorry; I really wasn't trying to pose a straw man, but when I was exploring the issues of hiring and firing, I came across some hypothetical quesitons that I thought perhaps needed attention.

Also, Hattie, do you really hold 'capitalists' to be exploiters of resources and labor? I mean, don't these capitalists provide employment,as well as making needed things available to consumers, rich and poor alike?

[Hattie]

Sharon: he was not eligible for Cobra. Not enough employees in the firm. Doesn't sound like much of a loss from what you say, though.
Any of you out there think Medicare's free? Think again.When my husband was employed, I had part A Medicare and my husband's insurance covering Part B. Now I have Kaiser (whoop-de-doo) covering everything for a mere $200.00 a month. My husband, a little younger than I, has adequate but not good Kaiser coverage, also for $200.00. That's $400.00 a month for us,not bad, actually. We have no health problems (yet) which is why we got it so cheap, I guess. But who knows what our premiums might be in the future? We have no control over what we're charged. I once vowed I would never go to Kaiser, but it's all I can get. It's that or do without medical care altogether. So we have no "choice" about coverage
Victoria: I think it's very kind of people to think that capitalists exist to make life good for the rest of us. Progress is our most important product. You're in good hands with Allstate. Better things for better living through chemistry. Entrepreneurs have made this country the economic powerhouse it is today. Small business people are like unto gods, whereas teachers are just people who can't really do things. Them as can, can. Them as can't teach.Helping others is fine, but serious people are into making money. I've heard it all so often. It's the mantra that has replaced any kind of social consciousness in the U.S.
But workers are the ones who create wealth, and the capitalists use up resources and bleed off the profits. Profits are what they are about. Period. If we peons get anything, it's to keep us from tearing down the place.
Of course the big money maker is "defense." That's what our tax money gets spent on, mostly. And it's been this way for years.

[Victoria]

A specter is haunting these posts - the specter of outdated Marxian theory...

Doesn't it take the initiative of say, a person or a group of persons in order to create the conditions in order to produce something ('bleed the workers'). It doesn't seem as if clusters of production merely crystallize, poof, from thin air. Sure, the workers might be doing a lot of the work that is required of production, but something must be said for the initiative and inventiveness that allowed for production to occur in the first place. I work at a small business and of course I COULD make the argument that my employer is draining my labor for her wealth, as she's sitting behind a desk most of the time and reaping the benefits while I do the very hard labor. However, she started her business on her own, without a single employee; her business grew because it was successful, and now she needs to employ people. Sure, I COULD argue that I don't benefit from the profits as much as she does(although the more successful her business is, the more hours I'm able to work, hence, the more money I'm able to make...), but it seems like an egregious error, as her seemingly 'cleaner' (I work in the animal care sector, which, quite obviously, is messy...) managerial position requires her to work twice as many hours, with twice as much mental focus. I think it'd be wrong if she didn't earn more than I.

[Hattie]

I hope your employer provides you with medical coverage, Victoria.

[suezboo]

South Africa is a Third World country, with an official unemployment rate of over 30%.Yet, we have a similar Labour Court which handles unfair dismissals and we have a Public Health service. We suffer from masses of poverty, inequality and various terrible problems. But, if our workers can have those basic rights, one would surely expect a First World country could offer the same.Could it be that we have a very active Union movement, as do Britain and France?

[high5]

John, your belief that "It seems to me that if an employee has the right to terminate his or her employment 'at will' then an employer should have the same right." Where did you get that from? I don't know exactly how it's done in the US but in my country, Sweden, when entering an employee-employer relationship you sign a contract. (Such a specter of outdated Marxian theory, right Victoria?) Such a contract usually says the employee has to give notification of his desire to quit working for the company. Depending on the company and your position that notification has to be done a certain time before you can actually leave the company. This can hardly be described as an employee terminating 'at will', as you put it.
As the employer has his/her responsibilities toward the employee, the employee has his/her responsibilities toward the employer.

[Barbara E]

Victoria -- You're right, it DOES take someone to organize "clusters of production." But there are alternatives to both private companies and the (communist) state -- eg, cooperative, group-based, businesses, where all workers have a voice. Why don't we have more of them here in the US?
Also, you are far too modest about your contribution to the company you work for. Workers (including white collar folks) don't just do "a lot of the work" -- the do the work, period. Maybe we need a little more self-esteem!

[Tina]

Hattie, I am really enjoying what you have to say! I can really identify with your piece about all the arguments that the real, serious people are making money, and the do-gooders are something less than respectable, and are those that can't DO! Yet, sadly, some part of me has also internalized these arguments, perhaps partly because I can't think of many good rebuttals. But thanks for helping me see that I'm not alone!!!

[brynn]

Frequently, the only factor separating capitalist employer from worker is dumb luck. GW Bush and his father had the luck to be born into wealth, hence, they enjoyed Ivy League educations, abundant seed capital, and connections—not only to form businesses but to save their asses if (as did GW miserably and more than once) they failed. My father, on the other hand, was born to off-the-boat Irish immigrants: never could afford college, served as an enlisted man in WWII, and toiled in low-paying jobs his whole working-life with no one to pick up the pieces if he failed.

Way more than half the wealth he generated with his labour went to his already-rich employers, simply because 1) they had the luck to possess money or assets in the first place; 2) with a surplus of workers, they could pit one worker against another to keep wages low; and 3) the force of the state ensured the unfair system would be maintained.

That my father is not now destitute is due to several factors, among them: 1) dumb luck he was labouring in the post-WWII economic boom, when lack of a college education was not an automatic sentence to poverty; 2) FDR’s social spending and taxation programs, including the GI Bill that allowed my dad to purchase his first home; 3) dumb luck (again!) that he purchased that first home in California and then profited from the insane real estate boom that allowed him to trade up several times and eventually purchase income property. He now lives modestly in his retirement.

Neocons have dismantled most of FDR’s programs; they’re itching to destroy Social Security, which contrary to propaganda, is one of the few government programs running a surplus. Since Reagan, they have achieved a monumental reversal of social spending and taxation that now re-distributes America’s vast wealth upwards, as it did in the era prior to FDR’s reforms. Upward class mobility in the US, always exaggerated, is now for all intents and purposes defunct.

And this is considered the best system people can devise?!

Americans have been brainwashed into worshiping the wealthy and despising the poor. It’s time they woke up and realised that the wealth of the ruling classes is utterly dependent on labour’s complicity.

[John]

High 5, in the U.S. it is common to work in an 'at will' arrangement. Yes, there can be contracts set up which stipulate terms of termination, and they may specify a period of notice, but these are not as common if not rare. Most work arrangements are a simple employer offer letter with signed acceptance by the employee. The 'at will' nature may be mentioned, or may not. Here in Colorado, I am told it is codified in a state statute. This means that the employee has no recourse in the courts.
I am originally from Canada and the convention was different there. Again, the actual employment contract was verbal or in letter form. However, the statute governing it set out that an employer needed to provide compensation for the period of time the employee would reasonably be expected to take to obtain a similar position elsewhere (which varies for just about everybody), unless the firing was for cause. The statute goes further in that it tries to then define 'cause'. This is the stuff lawyers live for. In most cases, unless the employee did something egregious, like theft and it could be easily proven, employers simply made an offer to settle. Interestingly, employees are not held to a similar arrangement, and could simply terminate and go. In cases where this would cause the employer significant hardship they could, of course, offer a contract which sets out the termination arrangement.

[Victoria]

What constitutes self-esteem? Would it be asking my employer to pay me more than the market value of my wage(realizing that there are a plethora of eligible applicants, as my job doesn't require training)? Or, would it be asking her to give me health insurance, when I realize it would be impossible to do so, if she herself were to have a "living wage"?

[A3K]

What a load of ignorance masquerading as concern for employee rights.

Barb, if an employer is concerned that it will be extremely costly to terminate an employee, then the decision to hire will never be made lightly.

You ignore the economic consequences of the French law which de Villepin is attempting to revise.

And to glorify the appalling behavior of those French students and communists... There's not enough contempt to pour on you for that.

[A3K]

Victoria,

There are no such things as markets. There's only justice, defined as a constantly moving target occupying a small place in the small minds of individuals for whom enough is never enough and not enough ought to be illegal.

Ask someone what the minimum wage should be. Hilarity will definitely ensue. No matter what number they come up with, someone will deem that insufficient as a "living wage".

BTW, the correct response to what the minimum wage should be is "More."

[Robin]

The current Vichy Republican dictatorship (no, they were NOT elected; they OWN the voting machines!) is the result of nearly half a century's dumbing-down of education. Fantasy-based curricula, stealth "Christian" fundamentalist blackballing and recruiting, and carte blanche (that's French!) for the corporate "privatizion" of any and every activity that would bring the government under criminal investigation has brought us to this point. We are three or four generations into a nation of mouton (That's French for sheep).

Dual citizenship looks better and better under our nation's current "as-long-as-I-benefit-right-away- who-cares" scenario.

Ce n'est pas une démocratie. (That's French for New Orleans.)

[Robin]

Forgive the typo: "privatization." Merci!

[Hattie]

BTW, the correct response to what the minimum wage should be is "More."
Well, A3K, for once you're right. I'd say maybe $10.00 an hour? According to my calculations, that would be $20,000. If the employer threw in medical coverage, I guess a family of four with two wages like that could get by.

[Ted]

A3K: "And to glorify the appalling behavior of those French students and communists... There's not enough contempt to pour on you for that."

The ignorance is yours, and my contempt is for you. The overwhelming majority merely demonstrated peacefully. A very small minority, some possibly not students, got a bit violent and, of course the media focus on them because they make more dramatic images. Idiots like you then take them to represent all the students demonstrating.

What you also ignore is that if employers can "lightly" decide to employ people they can also lightly decide to fire them and will, and hire a new cheap lot every two years.

[Ted]

I feel sorry for Victoria, she is a classic example of Chomsky's point about the main function of the education system is to get people to conform to the system and believe its myths. She should actually read Barbara's books and try to learn from them. Sadly it is usually only when reality hits people over the head that they really start asking questions (as happened to many young men in Vietnam, sometimes too late). Hattie, for example, has had the reality of the system revealed to her in a way which has freed her from its myths.

[A3K]

"BTW, the correct response to what the minimum wage should be is "More."
Well, A3K, for once you're right. I'd say maybe $10.00 an hour? According to my calculations, that would be $20,000. If the employer threw in medical coverage, I guess a family of four with two wages like that could get by."

Bull. You think a family of four could buy a home in New York on $40,000? You're insane. Where is your heart? $10/hr is inadequate.