French protests about raising retirement age.

[Undesired Walrus]

It's the spoiled child effect. For years mommy would give her precious angel everything he asked for, but now mommy's piggy bank is empty and precious angel can't get everything he wants.... waaaah! Waaaaaah! Waaaah! etc.

Is there any evidence they have been given everything they have been asked for?

 

[WildCat]

Is there any evidence they have been given everything they have been asked for?

They haven't?

 

[Eddie Dane]

It's also interesting to read that the French system started out, in the interbellum, as a funded system; but in 1941, the Vichy government needed money, expropriated the funds and started paying pensions out of current income. And once you're there, it's virtually impossible to go back.

I can't believe anyone voted for these guys.
What? Oh...

 

[Infoexcavator]

Obama wants to bring this to the US too with promises and change that will bankrupt the nation.

 

[DC]

Obama wants to bring this to the US too with promises and change that will bankrupt the nation.

thats what you get for voting for communists!

 

[geni]

They haven't?

No. Which is why sarkozy is already rather unpopular.

 

[geni]

Looks like things got violent overnight, lots of cars burned. I bet if they burn down the whole country prosperity is sure to follow! How could this plan go wrong?

Eh burning cars is normal for France. At least time around it's their cars.

 

[Francesca R]

Remember the French government always backs down without exception, like logo designers at GAP.

 

[Number Six]

The French wiki page says (if I'm reading this correctly), indeed what you say: you need 40.5 years of paying into social security to be able to retire. If you have less, your state pension is cut by 10% per missing year.

When you said French Wiki page you weren't kidding. That page was literally French.

But anyway, it seems you're saying that if someone retires after 31 years they only get 10% of their retirement and if they retire after 30 or less years they get nothing. That doesn't sound right though.

 

[ddt]

When you said French Wiki page you weren't kidding. That page was literally French.

When I wrote that, it seemed obvious to me. Now I see that phrasing was ambiguous.

But anyway, it seems you're saying that if someone retires after 31 years they only get 10% of their retirement and if they retire after 30 or less years they get nothing. That doesn't sound right though.

The cut of 10% per year only applies for early retirement. When you retire at the regular age of 65, you get a full pension - another French wiki explains two different formulae for the private and the public sector. When I understand it correctly, your pension then is independent of the actual number of years you've been working. The first page also mentions that in 2003 a law was passed, the Loi Fillon, which says that from 2015 onwards, the cut of 10% per premium-paying year you're missing will be decreased to 5%.

As I gather, Sarkozy's plan now is to increase both ages: the regular retirement age from 65 to 67, and the early retirement age from 60 to 62.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

Like many of we simple, naive types though, I suspect that a lot of French people always kind of 'assumed' that the State was tucking their contributions into a vast fund to provide for future pensions. Of course this was not true and - as Francesca has pointed out - pensions are paid out of current income.

See Ponzi scheme.

Here in the United States, we have the Socialist InSecurity system, which “works” exactly the same way, and will inevitably lead to the same tragic result.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

Looks like things got violent overnight, lots of cars burned. I bet if they burn down the whole country prosperity is sure to follow! How could this plan go wrong?

Indeed, this would surely help the French economy in exactly the same way that Obama's “Cash for Clunkers” scheme helped the American economy.

Perhaps we should try something similar here. If “Cash for Clunkers” was good for our economy, then we should burn down every building in the whole country. Think of all the new jobs that would be created building it all back up again from the ruins!

 

[GlennB]

See Ponzi scheme.

Which contains a brief analysis by the US SS Administration, including the following:

"However, since population demographics tend to rise and fall, the balance in pay-as-you-go systems tends to rise and fall as well. This vulnerability to demographic ups and downs is one of the problems with pay-as-you-go financing"

They said a mouthful there, eh? What with 'ups and downs' in this case including decades worth of declining birth rates, among other things.

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

Looks like things got violent overnight, lots of cars burned.

Any bets on whether the cranky old fogeys will beat the record set by the muslims "youths" 5 years ago (3 weeks of rioting, ~9,000 cars torched)?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_riots#Assessment_of_rioting

 

[DC]

Any bets on whether the cranky old fogeys will beat the record set by the muslims "youths" 5 years ago (3 weeks of rioting, ~9,000 cars torched)?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France_riots#Assessment_of_rioting

those burning down cars were not protesting the reform, they just saw an opportunity to burn down cars and took it. All protesters inteviewed, i saw, distanced them from that violent behavior. Also from the interviews i gather that they mostly see not the problem with rise of minimal age, but rather the rise in years of contribution.

Also did they agree that a reform is needed, but they dont want the reform proposed, thus not so simplistic like some posters like Wildcat draw it. typical. those with the least knowledge about the case are the ones with the loudest posts.....

 

[WildCat]

those burning down cars were not protesting the reform, they just saw an opportunity to burn down cars and took it. All protesters inteviewed, i saw, distanced them from that violent behavior. Also from the interviews i gather that they mostly see not the problem with rise of minimal age, but rather the rise in years of contribution.

Also did they agree that a reform is needed, but they dont want the reform proposed, thus not so simplistic like some posters like Wildcat draw it. typical. those with the least knowledge about the case are the ones with the loudest posts.....

It really is that simple, math isn't voodoo. You have to have a minimum number of people working to support the retirees.

 

[DC]

It really is that simple, math isn't voodoo. You have to have a minimum number of people working to support the retirees.

no the protests are not so easy like your simplistic world view.

not one of the proesters they interviewed said, no reform is needed, they objected to the propsed reform. mostly they objected against the rise of contribution years needed. they say with the new reform it will be hard for people to reach that new minimum years of contribution.

they all knew the current system will not last long. but that doesnt mean they have to agree with every propsed reform, now does it?
when you see a problem, do you accept the next best propsed solution?
have you even read the details of the reform? or just taken your knowledge from the missleading headlines?

 

[ddt]

It really is that simple, math isn't voodoo. You have to have a minimum number of people working to support the retirees.

Or the working people pay more into Social Security. There are more ways to go about reforming the system than raising the age. That's what DC's point was - he wasn't questioning the need to do something about the system, and nor, according to his post, were the protesters.

Now, I don't claim to offer an alternative. I know not more about the French pension system than what I read in those two wiki-pages (and even those, I didn't fully understand). And I guess, neither do you or most of the other posters here. It would be nice if there were a French poster chiming in with more background to it.

 

[excaza]

I'm sure a tax hike would go over real well.

 

[WildCat]

no the protests are not so easy like your simplistic world view.

not one of the proesters they interviewed said, no reform is needed, they objected to the propsed reform. mostly they objected against the rise of contribution years needed. they say with the new reform it will be hard for people to reach that new minimum years of contribution.

they all knew the current system will not last long. but that doesnt mean they have to agree with every propsed reform, now does it?
when you see a problem, do you accept the next best propsed solution?
have you even read the details of the reform? or just taken your knowledge from the missleading headlines?

Or the working people pay more into Social Security. There are more ways to go about reforming the system than raising the age. That's what DC's point was - he wasn't questioning the need to do something about the system, and nor, according to his post, were the protesters.

Now, I don't claim to offer an alternative. I know not more about the French pension system than what I read in those two wiki-pages (and even those, I didn't fully understand). And I guess, neither do you or most of the other posters here. It would be nice if there were a French poster chiming in with more background to it.

I'm sure it's no different from the bankrupt pension systems we have here in the US.

The only way to fix it is to reduce benefits, delay benefits, or increase taxes. And I'm not so sure there's much room left for a tax increase in France's case.

This is an inherent problem with defined benefit plans, especially in the public sector (and it was also a big problem in the private sector, which is why most use a defined contribution plan instead). There's all kinds of incentives to underfund the pension now (to pay for other things), or overestimating the growth of the funds, figuring that by the time the problem manifests itself you'll have been out of office for years or dead of old age. That's why Illinois has $80 billion in unfunded pension obligations today. It's far too easy to kick the problem down the road for Someone Else to worry about.

Problem in France is it can't be kicked down the road any longer, and Someone Else is the guy in the mirror.