French balk at working past 60

By Dale McFeatters

France's government-run retirement system has been running deficits averaging $15 billion and this year, with the recession cutting into revenues, the shortfall could be almost $45 billion. And the French have the demographic problems of other Western nations ― an aging, longer-lived population and a crush of boomers now retiring.

The retirement age in France is 60; the average for the European Union is 65. In the U.S., a person born after 1960 must wait until 67 to collect full Social Security benefits.

Therefore, it seemed to the government of President Nicolas Sarkozy a sensible and modest measure to raise the retirement age to 62 to keep the system from going bankrupt.

A large part of the French public went nuts in response. The unions and the students took to the streets. Demonstrators pelted police with rocks and bottles and set fire to cars and large heaps of trash left by striking trash collectors. The police responded with volleys of teargas.

Hundreds of high schools closed. Train service was severely curtailed, to less than half in some regions. Strikes shut down refineries and fuel depots. As of Tuesday, 4,000 gas stations were without gas. Hundreds of flights were cancelled. Foreign airlines were asked to see that their airliners arrived with enough fuel on board to leave.

Such eruptions in 1995 and 2006 forced earlier governments to back down on similar reforms. But not this time. Sarkozy has large majorities in both houses and a retirement age of 62 is basically a done deal, probably by week's end. The only question is how much political damage it will do to Sarkozy, who is up for reelection in 2012.

The unions have vowed to keep on protesting but many observers think the demonstrations will run out of steam starting Friday when high school students will desert the streets to ― go on vacation for the 10-day All Saints mid-term break.

The French have generous, if increasingly unaffordable, government-mandated benefits ― national health insurance, four weeks vacation, a 35-hour workweek. One of their objections to tampering with the retirement age is that it would put the country on the dangerous road to "American-style capitalism."

Considering the hash we've made of our housing and financial markets, state and local retirement systems and the increasing strains on Social Security, maybe they have a point.

Dale McFeatters is an editorial writer of Scripps Howard News Service (www.scrippsnews.com).