FRANCE: Strikes in France could have an impact on the economy if no solution is found to the discontent over reforms of workers' pensions

Record ID: 338541

  • Title: FRANCE: Strikes in France could have an impact on the economy if no solution is found to the discontent over reforms of workers' pensions
  • Date: 20th November 2007
  • Summary: VARIOUS OF TRAINS IN GARE DU NORD TRAIN STATION COMMUTERS IN RAILWAY STATION EMPTY TRACKS MORE OF TRAINS EIFFEL TOWER (SOUNDBITE) (English) ROGER COLES, BRITISH TOURIST, SAYING: "We've walked everywhere today, which has not been bad but, it's been nice, We've probably seen more of the city because we've been walking. But the time scales, we are not getting to as many pla
  • Embargoed: 5th December 2007 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: France
  • Country: France
  • Topics: Economic News,Employment
  • Reuters ID: LVA6MDZKO8RGB4FDJ63FZXAV5797
  • Story Text: French strikes which started nearly a week ago could harm the French economy.
    Transport workers, on their sixth day of strikes on Monday (November 19), are protesting against planned reforms of special pension privileges enjoyed by some public sector workers.
    Hours of work lost due to the strike are quickly racking up as commuters face severe difficulties getting to work and some employees take days off to avoid the strike altogether.
    Public transport chaos means that commuters have to spend twice as much time trying to go home. In this bar situated in the centre of Paris, clients have deserted the place in the evening.

    "This strike has definitely had an impact on our business, especially in the evenings. Lunch is not too affected because people who are working still come to eat but in the evening people only think about going home. It's been quite damaging for us. The drop in custom represents around 90 percent. It's enormous," said Andre Blaise who manages a cafe in Paris.
    With fewer shoppers, fewer staff to deal with customers and tourists deterred by the disruptions, firms are also counting the cost of lost business.

    "Certain sectors are more hit than others, shops in town centres are particularly hit, companies situated in or around Paris are also very much hit, but in general, it's the whole of the production sector which can be hard hit because their employees are simply struggling to get to their workplace.
    As a result, productivity can go down and a loss in benefits in the service sector," said economist Nicolas Bouzou, an analyst at Asteres consulting.
    Bouzou thinks that, although it would take more than one week of strikes for national economic growth to be affected, the impact could still have impact:
    "Usually we estimate that a strike which lasts one week deducts
    1 point of growth to the French economy. If the strikes last two or three weeks as it did last time in 1995, the cut in growth would be at around 0.2 or
    3 points. So it's not huge but at the same time it's not marginal, especially for an economy such as France's whose growth is weak," he said.
    Negotiations are going on behind closed doors between the government, public sector companies and workers' unions. According to Bouzou, it's in the interest of the government to end the movement crippling France for the past week:
    "I think that the government is well aware that a strike damages a country's growth, it also knows that it's not good for growth. Also, this government has predicted and is hoping for a 2 per cent growth for the year 2007. Today, we're not far off those 2 per cent so if we lose 0.1 per cent or
    2 per cent, then it could be difficult to reach those 2 per cent," said Bouzou.
    Tourists visiting the French capital have had to resort to walking to get to the different attractions of the city.

    "We've walked everywhere today, which has not been bad but, it's been nice, We've probably seen more of the city because we've been walking.
    But the time scales, we are not getting to as many places as we wanted to today. So we've walked along the river today and then tomorrow we're going to have another plan and hopefully the metro will be open and we'll be able to use the metro again tomorrow," said British tourist Roger Coles.
    The dispute centres on President Nicolas Sarkozy's plan to end so-called "special regimes" that let a few workers retire after 37.5 years of pension contributions compared to 40 years for everyone else.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2011. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register