Plan B Forum

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 1:51 am**

France Riots Disrupt Airport Travel In Paris & Beyond

PARIS — Workers opposed to a higher retirement age blocked roads to airports around France on Wednesday, leaving passengers in Paris dragging suitcases on foot along an emergency breakdown lane.

Outside the capital, hooded youths smashed store windows amid clouds of tear gas.

Riot police in black body armor forced striking workers away from blocked fuel depots in western France, restoring gasoline to areas where pumps were dry after weeks of protests over the government proposal raising the age from 60 to 62.

Riot officers in the Paris suburb of Nanterre and the southeastern city of Lyon sprayed tear gas but appeared unable to stop the violence.

Finance Minister Christine Lagarde said both the strikes and the violence were taking an economic toll.

"I'm calling on people to be responsible, in particular those who are having a roaring time blocking access and breaking things," she said in an interview with TF1 television. "It's serious for our country."

After months of largely peaceful disruptions, some protests erupted into scattered violence this week over the government's push to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62. President Nicolas Sarkozy vowed that his conservative party would pass the reform in a Senate vote expected Thursday.

Many workers feel the change would be a first step in eroding France's social benefits – which include long vacations, contracts that make it hard for employers to lay off workers and a state-subsidized health care system – in favor of "American-style capitalism."

Sarkozy ordered all fuel depots forcibly reopened and vowed Wednesday that he would "carry the retirement reform through to the end." And despite France's tolerance for a long tradition of strikes and protest, official patience appeared to be waning after weeks of actions that have snarled traffic, canceled flights and dwindling gasoline supplies and, now, rising urban violence.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/2 ... 69329.html

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 2:40 am**

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 3:04 am**

I can sympathise. For many years the Froggies had the best healthcare, the best pensions, the best holidays, the best social security, and a great standard of living, no one is going to give up all of that without a fight.

Gawd, you may as well move to America...

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 6:24 am**

I foolishly changed my superannuation plan to the new spangly one that was being introduced when I first commenced my work life.

I chose the new spangly one because I could access a larger lump sum when I left the public service in the years to come.

I say foolishly, because under the provisions of my original superannuation I would have been able to retire at the grand old age of 54 years and 11 months.

Bugger, bugger, bugger, bugger, bugger, and bugger some more.

Oh well. Never offer a large lump sum to a 20 year old in her first month as a public servant.

(If only I knew then what I know now.)

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 7:02 am**

The Hen wrote:I foolishly changed my superannuation plan to the new spangly one that was being introduced when I first commenced my work life.

I chose the new spangly one because I could access a larger lump sum when I left the public service in the years to come.

I say foolishly, because under the provisions of my original superannuation I would have been able to retire at the grand old age of 54 years and 11 months.

Bugger, bugger, bugger, bugger, bugger, and bugger some more.

Oh well. Never offer a large lump sum to a 20 year old in her first month as a public servant.

(If only I knew then what I know now.)

My dear Hen, to satisfy my curiosity may I ask which ministry of the federal government you work in at the monument. I assume you are a fed since you live in the ACT. It is the only game in town, right?

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 7:07 am**

"Gob, ducks and runs for cover...."

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 8:17 am**

There is actually two arms of government in the ACT, we have local and federal. I am in the local arm.

I presently work for the Department of Justice and Community Safety assisting Minister Simon Corbell (Minister for Police and Emergency Services, Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment, Climate Change and Water and Minister for Energy) with making sure things go right. Yes, that does cover a lot. But I only need to worry about the first two portfolios he holds. He is on his own (with others assisting) for the other two portfolios.

And no, despite appearances, he isn't a vegetarian.

Gob, I just checked up. You can actually retire at 55 thanks to being born in 1959 in preservation age component of our superannuation scheme. I only the other hand have to work until I am 58 which is 11 years time. (Curse my youth!)

I understand the French being outraged at the increase in retirement age. If I had to wait until I was 62 to retire after (almost) being able to retire at 54/11, I'd be pissed too.

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 9:51 am**

I presently work for the Department of Justice and Community Safety

Oh, so you're one of those folks Strop posts about who do things like run around measuring sidewalks to determine whether a business can put a potted plant in front of their store?

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 10:06 am**

No, the "community safety" part of it is the police force, ambulance and fireys and the "justice" part is the court system.

But there is a little bit of Elf and Safety in all departments really.

Oh alright, its a fair cop, we have the Work Safety Commissioner AND the Human Rights Commissioner as well.

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 12:14 pm**

[quote="[/i]

And no, despite appearances, he isn't a vegetarian.

.[/quote]

Lord, he looks young. Does his Momma know what he is doing?

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 12:28 pm**

Heh. He was born 21 November 1970, as I have just found out. So his 40th birthday is soon upon us.

Cheers for that liberty. I will be able to use that recently discovered information to its fullest.

(I see from his birthdate that the Minister is required to wait until he is 60 until he can access his funds. So effectively, unless he saves exceptionally well, he will have to wait longer than me or Gob to retire. Poor Simon. It is just getting harder and harder. I'd go on strike and disrupt air traffic if I were him.)

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 1:19 pm**

Outside the capital, hooded youths smashed store windows amid clouds of tear gas.

Let me see……

Hooded youths (shall we say 20ish?) showing deep concern about their retirement age going from 40 years into the future to 42 years OR just some ratbags out plundering the city for fun and profit?

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 3:37 pm**

Hooded youths (shall we say 20ish?) showing deep concern about their retirement age going from 40 years into the future to 42 years OR just some ratbags out plundering the city for fun and profit?

I don't know if I can deal with such tough questions this early in the morning, Tyro...

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 3:46 pm**

why's that? it's not like you have trouble parrying steves posts in the morning. and this one doesn't even fall into the so stupid it makes your head hurt category.

Posted: **Fri Oct 29, 2010 6:38 pm**

Crackpot wrote:why's that? it's not like you have trouble parrying steves posts in the morning. and this one doesn't even fall into the so stupid it makes your head hurt category.

Rhetoricals are harder before the first 4 cups of coffee.

Posted: **Sat Oct 30, 2010 5:22 pm**

Retirement age is a public policy question connecting inputs and outputs. It is wasteful of resources to err too far on either side.

The demonstrations really do look like whining here. If you can't pay for retirement at 60 and can at 62 then the issue is settled.

yrs,
rubato

Posted: **Sun Oct 31, 2010 12:29 am**

This is an interesting issue in both the public and private sector, in all developed Western countries.

What if your employer "promises" you a certain pension benefit ("Defined Benefit"), and the employer goes bankrupt? What are you "entitled" to?

In the U.S., and particularly in Western Pennsylvania, we've had scores of heavy industry employers who agreed to absurdly generous pension benefits, then quite predictably went down the tubes when large number of their employees became eligible at the same time as a major contraction in the industry. So we had people in their early 50's -already retired - who were crying outside the bankruptcy court because their retirements were possibly gone, more likely turned over the the the federal pension guarantee agency (I don't recall the name of it right now).

Those of us who are paying the bill (the taxpayers), are rightly a bit indignant that we are paying tens of billions of dollars to support retirement benefits that were never "earned" an any real sense, and are much, much more generous than 80% can ever access. Here I am at age 61, paying to support the retirement benefits of people in their 50's. How cool is that?

More recently, our Beloved President and his socialist cronies spend many tens of billions of dollars, basically bailing out the UAW, which had supported them in previous elections. Had these companies gone through Bankruptcy (which, in fact, is designed to deal with such economic tragedies), the companies would have been broken up, the successful product lines surviving and the non-viable ones going down the tubes. Just like pruning a bush in the garden.

But what of the situation where the employer is a government agency? We have a trillion dollar plus problem in this country, with the same copulating thing. Public sector employers, having no skin the the game, have year after year made absurd concessions to Gub'mint employees, for the express purpose of buying them off so they would reliably vote democrat in future elections. Now, the municipalities and states are essentially bankrupt, and we the taxpayers will again be supporting sluggards who in decades past were so mediocre that the only job they could find was a government job, again retiring at age 50 or 52, while we work to near 7o, to keep them cozy and warm in their thirty and forty year retirements.

Nice, huh?

In all these cases, as in France today, the beneficiaries of these programs care not one whit about where the money shall come from. all they know is that they WANT it, and they don't want to hear any excuses why they won't get it. F--ck everyone but me, laddy.

Posted: **Sun Oct 31, 2010 1:21 am**

A shame you have to spoil your post with attacks on people Dave.

You have not one scintilla of proof that all of these people are "sluggards who in decades past were so mediocre that the only job they could find was a government job", and, as someone who has worked for the government in two counties, three if you include Wales, I know that you cannot be more wrong.

Why not debate the issues instead of attacking people? Or if you are going to attack people, at least have the courtesy to back your points up with evidence.

There is something particularly unpleasant about the sort of person who tries to make themselves feel good by putting others, especially others who have no right of reply, down.

Posted: **Sun Oct 31, 2010 1:46 am**

I'd go as far as to say Dave's posts is a mirror image of the Steve and Edi; "MOTU Bad! Capitalist Bad!!" stupidity, and just as insightful...

Posted: **Sun Oct 31, 2010 6:02 am**

dgs49 wrote:
"... Had these companies gone through Bankruptcy (which, in fact, is designed to deal with such economic tragedies), the companies would have been broken up, the successful product lines surviving and the non-viable ones going down the tubes. Just like pruning a bush in the garden.
... "

aaah yes, the "Herbert Hoover" strategy.

Didn't work, did it?

yrs,
rubato

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