Thousands of people demonstrated this Tuesday in France, where there is a day of strikes demanding salary increases that compensate for inflation and solidarity with the strikers of the refineries that the government requisitioned.
More resources for schools, hospitals and social security, abandonment of the unemployment insurance reforms and the delay in the retirement age from 62 to 65 years, wage increases due to inflation… these are the claims.
The final straw for four unions and several youth associations was that the government requisitioned striking personnel from refineries to try to compensate for fuel shortages.
Professional high school students, energy or transport sector employees, shopkeepers, civil servants, etc., were called to strike to defend the right to strike and demand a salary increase.
The strike, three days before the school holidays, however, had an uneven follow-up. In transport, the Paris region, for example, registered the main disturbances, albeit moderate.
The strike, rejected by 49% of the French, comes in a tense social context. It represents the prelude to a hot autumn and winters for the reformism of President Emmanuel Macron.
The fear of losing purchasing power was the main concern of the French during the last electoral cycle and the call to save energy to avoid blackouts in winter makes the atmosphere rarefied.
When France was beginning to turn the page on the pandemic, Russia launched an offensive in Ukraine which, together with Moscow’s response to Western sanctions, sent energy and food prices skyrocketing.
France, the second largest economy in the European Union (EU), recorded the lowest harmonized inflation rate in the euro zone in September, 6.2% year-on-year, below other economies such as Germany (10.9%), Italy (9.5%) and Spain (9.3%).
