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Strikes and Protests Across France as Macron Faces Pensions Showdown Over a Million Protest Macron’s Pension Plan in the Streets of France
(about 3 hours later)
Classrooms in France were empty, trains were still and the Paris metro was heavily disrupted on Thursday as hundreds of thousands of workers around the country went on strike and protested President Emmanuel Macron’s plans to raise the legal age of retirement. PARIS — More than a million protesters, chanting slogans like “retirement before arthritis,” took to the streets throughout France to protest President Emmanuel Macron’s plan to raise the legal age of retirement to 64 from 62.
More than 200 demonstrations were planned, and the authorities expected 550,000 to 750,000 protesters to march on the first day of what could be a prolonged showdown between the government and a united front of labor unions. Striking workers, from Calais in the north to Marseille in the south, closed schools, stopped many trains, disrupted the Paris Metro, lowered electricity output and curtailed flights, as France once again roused itself to resist tampering with its protective social model.
Teachers, railway workers and employees at public radio stations and oil refineries went on strike, traffic at the northern port of Calais ground to a halt and the Eiffel Tower was closed. Labor unions at France’s national electric utility company, where nearly 45 percent of employees were on strike, said they had intentionally lowered output. Mr. Macron, who is in the first year of his second and last term, wants to push through an overhaul of what he views as an untenable pension system. He sees this as a core part of his legacy. But in a country where work is viewed by many as a burden rather than an opportunity, and retirement as the panacea beyond it, his determination has ignited fierce resistance.
The walkout represents a crucial test for both the unions, who need a show of strength, and for Mr. Macron, who is hoping to forge ahead despite widespread popular opposition to his plans, which include a measure to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64. Labor unions, from the extreme left to the moderate center, united behind the protests, as did often splintered left-of-center political parties. Marine Le Pen, the leader of the extreme-right National Rally party that has attracted growing support among the working class, also called for “an unjust reform” to be blocked.
“If there is no positive response from the government, today is a first step, and there will be a second step,” Philippe Martinez, the head of the CGT labor union, told reporters before the march in Paris. In Paris, where the strikers’ march stretched over two-and-a-half miles, Corinne Arramy, a hospital worker, wore a sticker saying “We live longer and that’s for the best, not a reason to die at work.” Ms. Arramy, 56, said “This is the start of something big,” a fight to preserve a hard-earned right.
The strikes and protests were an echo of 2019, when Mr. Macron first tried to retool France’s complex but generous state-backed pension system by overhauling it entirely. Those plans prompted huge demonstrations until the coronavirus pandemic forced the government to drop them. Teachers, railway workers and employees at public radio stations joined more than a million protesters at more than 200 demonstrations across the country, according to the Interior Ministry. The CGT labor union put the number at over two million. On Thursday evening, the labor unions welcomed the day’s “powerful mobilization” and called for a new day of strikes and protests on Jan. 31.
Mr. Macron’s newest plan is a more straightforward attempt to balance the system’s budget by making the French work longer. Chants of “Metro, Work, Tomb” rose from the crowds in derisory dismissal of what is widely portrayed as a government attempt to squeeze the last of pleasure from life in a hypercompetitive world.
The plan, presented last week and expected to be discussed by Parliament in February, would also accelerate a previous change that increased the number of years that workers have to pay into the system to get a full pension. A long confrontation, involving further strikes, seems inevitable. For the French left, which has failed to reach even the runoff round of the last two presidential elections, defeating pension changes amounts to a critical test of its heft and ultimately of its eventual capacity to return to power.
But the latest public opinion polls show that roughly 60 percent of French people are opposed to Mr. Macron’s plans, despite measures that the government says will keep the system fair, like continued exemptions allowing those who begin working at younger ages to retire earlier. Older job seekers, who have found themselves effectively shut out of France’s labor market, are particularly worried about the prospect of delayed retirement. For Mr. Macron, a centrist who tried and failed with a different pension overhaul in 2019 that also provoked massive protests, it is the crux of his attempt to give direction to a second term that has up to now seemed a time of drift. He has vowed, since his election campaign last year, to see the changes through.
By noon on Thursday, hundreds of thousands of protesters had marched in Nantes, Marseille, Toulouse and other cities, chanting and carrying signs with slogans like “Retirement before arthritis.” The biggest protest was in the capital, Paris, where the Place de la République was crammed with demonstrators. The government believes the only way to balance the pension system is to make the French work longer. Workers and employers pay mandatory payroll taxes that are used to fund state pensions, but the ratio of workers to retirees has dropped sharply as life expectancy has increased. In 2000, there were 2.1 workers paying into the system for every one retiree, a number that fell to 1.7 in 2020.
Fearful of the clashes between police officers in riot gear and violent protesters that often mar French demonstrations, many stores in Paris had boarded up their windows. Over 10,000 police officers were deployed across the country to bolster security at the protests, the authorities said. “If you want the pact between generations to be just, this reform is essential, and so we will do it with respect, a spirit of dialogue, but also determination and responsibility,” Mr. Macron said during a visit on Thursday to Barcelona.
In Paris, near the Place de la Bastille, Thomas Ouvriard, 20, a political science university student, and Ignacio Franzone, 23, a worker at the French post office, smiled as they hoisted up a gigantic poster that depicted Mr. Macron dressed as King Louis XIV with an unflinching stare. However, the government’s arithmetic is fiercely contested by labor leaders who argue that taxing the country’s millionaires and their dividends, increasing salaries and cutting tax cuts for companies, would be a more effective way to fund the current pension system. “Pensions are something sacred in France,” said Matthieu Jilard, 26, a student who joined the Paris protest.
Rising inflation has contributed to a restive mood in France, but at a deeper level the overhaul attempt reveals ingrained attitudes toward work, equated with drudgery, and retirement, equated with the freedom at last to enjoy life.
A recent survey by the IFOP polling and marketing company found that only 24 percent of French people considered work “very important,” compared with 60 percent in 1990. The feeling of being unrecognized or taken for granted in the workplace appears widespread.
France is something of an outlier on pensions among European countries, many of which have already pushed back retirement for the very reasons Mr. Macron has outlined. In Germany, the legal age of retirement is 65 and is being gradually increased to 67. Spain is also working toward retirement at 67.
But some countries allow workers to retire before the legal age, provided they have paid into the system long enough. Italy, for instance, has also set 67 as the legal age of retirement, but many leave their jobs earlier.
Still, in France workers generally leave the labor market two to three years earlier than in other major European economies, according to an official advisory body called the Pensions Advisory Council.
The overhaul would raise the legal age of retirement in annual three-month increments, starting this fall, to reach 64 by 2030, three years after Mr. Macron, who is subject to term limits, leaves office. Parliament will begin discussing the bill next month, and Mr. Macron hopes it will become law by the summer.
That target, however, appears ambitious. “If there is no positive response from the government, today is a first step, and there will be a second step,” Philippe Martinez, the head of the CGT, told reporters before the march in Paris.
Police officers in riot gear deployed in large numbers, and many stores in Paris boarded up their windows. But violence appeared limited.
In Paris, near the Place de la Bastille, Thomas Ouvriard, 20, a political science university student, and Ignacio Franzone, 23, a worker at the French post office, hoisted a large poster of Mr. Macron dressed as King Louis XIV looking out with an unflinching stare. “Macron the scornful,” it said.
“Of course in France, we have cut off the heads of kings in our past history,” Mr. Franzone said. “We’re not there yet with Macron, but we’re here to win this fight.”“Of course in France, we have cut off the heads of kings in our past history,” Mr. Franzone said. “We’re not there yet with Macron, but we’re here to win this fight.”
Both men said they were protesting partly out of solidarity but also out of concern for their own futures. They argued that the government should fund the pension system by raising taxes on the wealthy and on companies, rather than by making people work longer. The perception of Mr. Macron as arrogant and remote, established during his first term, has proved hard to overcome. His zigzagging between right and left, while politically effective in the emasculation of the Socialist Party and the Republicans, long the two main political forces of postwar France, has also alienated some people.
“As it is, young people have a really hard time getting jobs, so we’re starting to work later in life and we’re going to have to keep working later,” Mr. Ouvriard said. France instituted a retirement age of 60 in 1981, only to retreat, and a 35-hour week in 1997. The degree of social protection is a source of great pride in a country long resistant to the more cutthroat capitalism of what it calls “Anglo-Saxon” economies. It is a measure of the distance between protesters and the government that some labor unions and Mr. Le Pen have called for bringing the retirement age forward to 60 from 62.
At midday on Thursday, labor unions said that 65 to 70 percent of teachers were on strike in elementary, middle and high schools; the education ministry said the figure was lower, about 35 to 42 percent. Alluding to the prime minister, Élisabeth Borne, the far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon declared after she had presented the pension plan: “With a stroke of the pen, Ms. Borne and Mr. Macron are repealing 40 to 50 years of social progress.”
“The government has lost its first battle: convincing people that the reform is necessary,” Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the prominent leftist politician of the France Unbowed party, and a fierce opponent of Mr. Macron, told reporters in Marseille. Guy Groux, a labor specialist at Sciences Po’s Centre for Political Research, said the protests on Thursday were a boost for unions, but he cautioned that it was still unclear how long they could keep up the pressure on Mr. Macron.
Nationwide, many trains were canceled. In Paris, a handful of metro lines were completely shut down, and many were open only during rush hour or heavily disrupted. Service was also intermittent on many of the Paris region’s commuter lines, some of the busiest in Europe. “The first success is that they are all united, which is rare in France,” Mr. Groux said. “What’s at stake for the unions now is to make the movement last.”
The disruptions did not fuel chaos in train stations, however, because many Parisians elected to work from home or use different modes of transportation. Unions could continue disruptive transportation and fuel strikes, but it remains to be seen who the French would ultimately blame, Mr. Groux added.
But the delays and cancellations did fuel frustration. At the Gare du Nord, a major train station in Paris, Catherine Gross, 42, was fuming in front of the station board. “Between the unions and Macron, the real referee will be public opinion,” he said.
“My train keeps getting delayed, I’ve been wandering around the station for two and a half hours,” said Ms. Gross, an insurance saleswoman. “I’m sorry to say that about the strikers, but they are getting on my nerves.” Constant Méheut, Liz Alderman and Tom Nouvian contributed reporting.
When another train that she was supposed to take was canceled, she said she had lost all hope of getting to her office in Gennevilliers, north of Paris.
“I get that they are fighting for their right to retire at 62, but right now they are not influencing Emmanuel Macron or Élisabeth Borne, they are just hurting the ones that are willing to go to work,” she said, referring to France’s president and prime minister.
Olivier Dussopt, the French labor minister, told the LCI news channel that the government respected the right of strikers to protest but did not want the country to come to a standstill.
“When it comes to pensions, there are always concerns,” Mr. Dussopt said. “We know that we are asking the French to collectively work more.”
“All pension reforms have had difficulties with public opinion,” Mr. Dussopt added. “For every French person, it is a very personal question.”
Liz Alderman and Tom Nouvian contributed reporting.