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Chirol
Author

Chirol

Date

July 13th, 2009

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Pay Up or Blow Up

As the economic downturn continues, might we see things like this increasing, and perhaps one day even occurring in the US? We already saw the recent spate of bossnappings.

Workers at a failed French car parts supplier are threatening to blow up their factory unless the company’s two biggest clients – Renault and PSA Peugeot Citroen – stump up extra compensation. Employees of the engine parts maker New Fabris have rigged up a series of gas canisters inside a factory workshop which they say will be detonated on July 31 if the two carmakers fail to pay €30,000 to each of the 366 workers facing unemployment.

Anyone worried about their job should try to find something more locally oriented and not vulnerable to global disruption. Easier said than done of course. Will actions like these further push jobs overseas? If the financial crisis worsens or drags on too long, it makes one wonder what such desperation would lead to in those circumstances.

Comments to this entry

kurt9
July 13, 2009
11:42 pm
These are bad economic times. However, I have heard from reliable sources that even during good economic time that if you loose your job in Europe, that it is near to impossible to get a new job. The basic problem of Europe is that the socialistic nature of their economic system makes it difficult for people to start new businesses and we all know well that almost all job creation in the U.S. since 1980 has been with small to medium size companies or with new businesses.

I am not surprised at these actions.
T. Greer
July 14, 2009
12:14 am
Maybe this will happen. But France is home to annual national labor protests, is it not? How much sway does culture have over such things?
kurt9
July 14, 2009
2:21 am
Yes, France is famous for its labor protests, often over nothing of substance. The protests in Paris in 1968 were about issues that I have never been able to determine myself.
Chirol
July 14, 2009
2:40 am
Kurt9: That's a sweeping generalization. There are major differences within Europe which cannot all be described as just "socialism." In Scandinavia, for example, there are minimal laws regarding hiring and firing but generous unemployment, retraining programs etc. Germany is more of a balance between the two while Spain and Italy for example have very very strict labor rules but weak social programs if you lose your job.
kurt9
July 15, 2009
7:34 pm
Chirol, I base my comments on conversations I've had with Europeans living in Asia. There is a common theme to what I hear from these people about how there is no opportunity in much of Europe and about how difficult it is to start a business there. I will add more. I met a guy, originally from France on a flight in Asia a couple of years ago. He told me that once you go into a job or career in France, you are pigeon holed for life. You cannot change and do anything else. He also told me that if you loose your job, it is next to impossible to get a new comparable job. This guy started out as a high school biology teacher, then later decided he wanted to be a pilot. He came to the U.S. to go to flight school, then got a job with a small air cargo company in British Columbia, Canada. At the time I met him, he was flight 2nd officer for a start-up airline, JetStar, based out of Singapore.

He said that there is no way on Earth he could have done what he did while remaining in France or any other part of Europe. His story is very similar to those I hear from others. I know a guy, a scientific instrument engineer, who has lived and worked in Japan (my former employer) for the past 11 years (he lived in Switzerland before). He has no plans to go back to France anytime soon. He also says there is no opportunity in France (and much of the rest of Europe, for that matter) and that it is generally speaking, a terrible place to do business.

Chirol, although I have not lived in Europe, I lived in Asia for 10 years and have met many Europeans. There is some reality to my comments here. I am not pulling this stuff out of my ass.
TiP
July 16, 2009
1:40 am
Personally, I hope that we see more of this type of activity - I fear it may be the only way to bring a force to bear against the global elite oligarchs running the show that they truly understand.

Time and time and time again, it's been shown that the string-pullers won't listen to the common worker; the only way to bring them to task, it seems, is to strike against one of the only things they truly care about: infrastructure.

Bravo to the French workers involved.
Diego Méndez
July 23, 2009
11:22 am
Kurt9,

France is not the whole of Europe. Moreover, if you only talk to expats, your input is skewed towards negative, non-updated visions of Europe.

"I have heard from reliable sources that even during good economic time that if you loose your job in Europe, that it is near to impossible to get a new job." You may have heard it, but it is plainly false.

And you can't compare the level of entrepreneurship in Europe with that of Japan. Just look at the stats. And while you're at it, learn that the EU did create more jobs than the US in the past decade, even before the US financial system collapsed.

On the other hand, those terrorizing threats of those French workers can't be taken seriously and are exceptional even by French standards.
b
July 23, 2009
6:01 pm
No, we are too fat and lazy to do that! We would just get our welfare checks and blow them on beer, chips and Big Macs.