It's pleasing for many reasons to see that the French have rejected the proposed European Union constitution. The only problem is that the story says that the voters were displeased because the constitution wouldn't have protected France's social welfare system as strongly as the leftists would have liked. I've skimmed through the European constitution, and it's no right-wing capitalist dream -- far from it -- but it would have forced France to lower some of its protectist walls while at the same time sucking power away from the populace and entrusting it to a permanent elite bureaucracy. Unfortunately, the threat to their liberty didn't seem to scare the French as much as the potential loss of their 35-hour work week... which makes one wonder if their taste for freedom has already been extinguished.
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I rather like the 35 hour week the French have. It forces them to do something more interesting with their life, like spending time with their kids or setting up existentialist hip-hop collectives. It's one of their better conceits imo.
The media has to say something, but this doesn't mean you have to take them seriously.
Of course the truth is that virtually no one voting Sunday had actually read the document (they didn't in Spain either, but Spain is a big-time net recipient of EU funding, so it's no surprise Spaniards voted for more of that), and even if they had it's a bit of stretch to believe they'd have been able to make any sort of analysis about how it would've influenced things inside France. So the vote should be seen not as a rejection of this particular version, but more as a rejection of a Europe-wide political union (most citizens of EU nations are OK with economic cooperation) deep enough to require something called a constitution in the first place.
But the EU pushing mainstream media won't say this. Instead, as is usually done when ordinary Europeans show skepticism about the EU or its doings, it'll be spun as a lack of information, which EU commissioners should work to correct blah blah -- i.e. the usual condescending crap. In the end it'll result in little more than a campaign to shame the French, who'll probably be asked to re-vote on more or less the same document in the not too distant future.
jez: The problem is that it's illegal for most people to work more than 35 hours. That's ridiculous. Shouldn't people be free to choose, rather than be hobbled?
eh: That's a good point. Most voters were probably rejecting the idea rather than the specifics.
actually, i think most voters were rejecting Chirac rather than anything to do with Europe.
A maximum working week is not necessarily ridiculous. In real terms it probably increases freedom. In our societies, competition effectively forces most of us into working much longer hours.
Jez, if you're willing to forego certain luxuries and the prestige of a high-powered job, you can work forty hours if you want to.
if by "certain luxeries" you include "buying a house", maybe. not in my area, I think. But you understand surely, that if no-one can work over the maximum then that area of competition is removed, and people compete in productivity and flair instead.
Anyway, I don't expect you boys to support it (and I don't think I do, I'm just intrigued by the idea) -- but it is interesting that the primary form of freedom that you wish to defend is freedom to make economic decisions, freedom to work for money is automatically more important than other kinds of freedom.
Jez,
A lot of it depends on where exactly you want to buy a house. If in California, perhaps. Here in Pocatello, Idaho, it's a different story. Houston and its suburbs (where I'm from) is better than SoCal but worse than Pocatello. If you want to live off the coast or in the city, you might indeed need to work for forty hours a week. But that's a rather limited selection of options.
But in any case, I understand. I'm not a very corporate person myself and once my fiance and I get settled down somewhere I'm likely to check out of the corporate world and be a stay-at-home father or a teacher. With that it would be quite nice not to have to compete with people working 60-hour weeks when it comes to mortgage loans and whatnot. But because I don't want to make those sacrifices doesn't mean I should penalize those, for instance, without children and more devotion to their career by making them work under 40 hours a week.
That's my perspective, anyhow.
jez: Economic freedom usually goes hand-in-hand with other freedoms. Competition leads to efficiency. If no one could work more than 35/40 hours, then the market would have no way to distinguish between the cream and the crud, and investors would suffer for it. Housing prices might come down, but the real value of housing (and everything) would drop faster.
what do you mean -- is the only way for a person to distinguish himself in the labour marked to work longer hours?
The French and the Dutch showed that they are first French or Dutch,then European.I never read the new constitution of the European Union,but it seem like to unite all the European nation to a United Europe,with a single president,federal government and so on.
Europeans want to copy the United States which is not possible.In United States,there is one language,religion,culture and civilization.But in Europe,each country has his own culture,language,history and civilization.
I am sure that the French will not accept Polish coming to France for having 3 Euros per hour.In fact,it is a very complicated issue,one must not sell his country for a better future.