WORK LESS Institute of Technology

LES 35 HEURES

Last Thursday the French Prime Minister, Pierre Raffarin, announced measures to fatally weaken the 35-hour law in France. Coverage of this issue in the English-language press is, as usual, entirely from the perspective of the employers' organizations, ultraliberal economists and the right-wing politicians. For example, a report originating from Agence France Presse says that the 35 hour law "has come under attack for helping create the country's stubbornly high unemployment."

Both the OECD and the French government have credited the 35 hour law with creating 350,000 - 400,000 jobs. That is less than the Socialist government had expected but it is not nothing and it certainly didn't "create unemployment."

The 35 hour week will remain in force nominally but enforcement will be "eased" in several ways, such as allowing employers to "negotiate" longer working times, increasing the amount of overtime that can be accumulated from 180 to 220 hours and making the overtime payable in money instead of time off.

Here is Raffarin's "Contract with France, 2005" report. The changes to the 35 hour law are on pages 9 and 10.

And here's the responses so far of a few of my internet contacts in France.

Bernard Girard says "reforming" the 35-hour law will increase inequality and is bad for employment: "La réforme des 35 heures va augmenter les inégalités et c’est mauvais pour l’emploi."

Emmanuel at Ceteris Paribus writes in part 1 of a series on working less to live better that just looking at the employment effects or the GDP effects of the 35 hour law ignores the benefit that comes from having more free time: "Travailler moins pour vivre mieux."

See also the previous post by Emmanuel Révisionnisme in which he marvels at the ability of the right to frame the debate on the 35 hour week by making up facts. Sound familiar?

Posted by sandwichman at December 14, 2004 11:11 PM