Get ready for riots. Macron trying to increase pension age in France

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Usually I'm not a fan of union busting, but

Unless the topic of conversation is a police union or something, this is where I tune out and go back to reading my pulp sci-fi novel du jour.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The presupposition that goes into this approach, which is itself reasonable if you concede that presupposition, is that other aspects of current work culture like working conditions and working hours have to stay the way they are, in other words, that no matter how much automation happens we still have to prop up or even increase the total amount of time people spend working. Giving people more time to do things other than work is a foundational leftist goal going back hundreds, maybe even thousands, of years. Let's not just give up on it now of all times in history.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The presupposition that goes into this approach, which is itself reasonable if you concede that presupposition, is that other aspects of current work culture like working conditions and working hours have to stay the way they are, in other words, that no matter how much automation happens we still have to prop up or even increase the total amount of time people spend working.

That's not the only valid presupposition. There's still value in raising the pension age even if all basic needs can be met with fewer workers than before.

As consumers, voters are going to keep valuing cheaper stuff and policies they believe will deliver cheaper stuff (and curbing consumerism is well beyond Macron's capabilities). Unfortunately, this often translates into an incentive to squeeze workers. The incentive is most strongly counterbalanced by the fact that voters are also workers. This incentive is absent for pensioners. If the proportion of the electorate which draws the state pension rises, the electorate is likely to make things worse for workers.

Giving people more time to do things other than work is a foundational leftist goal going back hundreds, maybe even thousands, of years. Let's not just give up on it now of all times in history.

I agree. We should have a four or three-day workweek, and more 62-year-olds should have a stake in making this happen.

This is a reasonable argument, but based on Macron's now-extensive track record of crass rightism masquerading as enlightened liberal post-post-post-ideological galaxy brain, the chances that the specific policy being protested is part of an overall vision even remotely similar to this are about on par with the chances of one of my roommate's pet geckos getting elected Pope.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The phrase that keeps coming to mind with regards to Flawless Beautiful Macron is "Woke Pinochet". "Vote for me because the alternative is the scary authoritarian right. Also, I'm going to use this One Neat Constitutional Trick to force through a calculatedly regressive pension 'reform' that the country hates without any parliamentary scrutiny. Remember to vote LREM to stop the parafascists!"

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

The phrase that keeps coming to mind with regards to Flawless Beautiful Macron is "Woke Pinochet". "Vote for me because the alternative is the scary authoritarian right. Also, I'm going to use this One Neat Constitutional Trick to force through a calculatedly regressive pension 'reform' that the country hates without any parliamentary scrutiny. Remember to vote LREM to stop the parafascists!"

You can call Macron authoritarian sure, but comparing using a dodgy procedural trick to a two decade fascist dictatorship is... a choice.

I mean the comparison isn't really serious; I tend not to use "woke" unironically either. If you think it's in poor taste, sure, I'll concede that it probably is.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I am against this entire concept of pensions

We know you are, jaichind; don't worry.