Wednesday, March 15, 2006

contre l'embauche

France is up in flames again. This time it's not the disenfranchised kids of immigrants burning cars and throwing bottles at the police. No, it's college and highschool student occupying places of higher education and throwing bottles at the police. What's this all about?

It's the "first employment contract" (contrat de première embauche, CPE), a contract designed to entice employers to hire those fresh out of graduate school or apprenticeship who have never held a job before. As I understand it, the contract has no time limit but a two-year probation period during which the new hire can be terminated with no reason given.

The unemployment rate for the 18 to 25 age group is 23% in France, almost three times the average for the entire population. Obviously, something needs to be done. Trade unions, students (who have a union themselves) and apprentices think the CPE is not the right way, and they base their claim mainly on the perceived increased "précarité". How can you buy a house (the biggest craze in France for several years now) if you don't even know that you'll have a job in two year's time?

It's undeniable that a two-year probation increases precariousness over the permanent contract that every French aspires to and that most will hold eventually. But it's equally undeniable that a job is better than collecting unemployment benefits, and it cracks me up to see unions mobilize the masses to protest this.

Only in France would organized labor oppose employment. And the country will be on strike tomorrow.

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