Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

cbc.ca

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 835 posts

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#291

Post by AussieWog93 »

notch898a wrote: post #290
AussieWog93 wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's basically the system we started rolling out in Australia in the 90s (see mandatory super). Unfortunately it doesn't work for everyone, though, and a traditional pension is still needed as a backup.

It seems like unfortunately many governments have proven incapable of responsibly handling the money. In the case the government is entirely incapable of handling the money I'd at least see the worker get that tax waved to have something for whatever meager existence is left with the money.

Honestly, our system works really well for 90% of people. Look into it.

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#292

Post by _2uwr »

yodsanklai wrote: post #127
moremetadata wrote: post #92

This is another example of how the state gets its numbers wrong, promising something it can not deliver without bankrupting the country. France is not alone, other country's have raised the pension age, but other countries use their food legislation to keep the population docile, high house prices to keep people from protesting for fear of losing a roof over their head, and other tactics people are getting wise to an…

> This is another example of how the state gets its numbers wrong, promising something it can not deliver without bankrupting the country. France pension system isn't close to bankruptcy. It needs some adjustment but pushing retirement age isn't the only option. Also one thing to understand is that there are two criteria to get a full pension 1. work 43 years (this used to be 36.5 but has been increased 10 years ago)…

> France pension system isn't close to bankruptcy.

You are in the Euro zone now and whilst France, Germany and Italy are the main sponsors, I haven't forgotten the Greek Govt crisis of 2009.

I know Norwegians are paper millionaires because of where the Norwegian govt has invested like a state hedge fund, but start cashing that in and and like share prices, the status of paper millionaire will decline rapidly, in much the same way if Zuck cashed in his Facebook shares.

> France isn't like the US were people are incentized to build equity for their retirement.

I know, the price of some of your chateaux's are an absolute steal compared to UK houseprices.

> The rule of the game here is that current employees pay for retirees and in exchange expect their pension to be taken care of when they are older. The rules are changing midway and people are upset about it.

Well the US Boomer rhetoric perhaps exemplifies the younger generations dislike of their grandparents (and parents) being able to raise a family on one wage, job for life, afford a reasonable family sized home, and have a comfortable lifestyle and retirement, shows how some countries have kind of shafted their young.

Here in the UK, the North Sea oil and gas revenues were _supposed_ to have paid off the UK's national debt, I see that hasnt happened!

But with govt's like this, who needs enemies, when the vampire state sucks the life out of you with the "Death and taxes" idiom.

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#293

Post by luckylion »

konschubert wrote: post #152
luckylion wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main difference is that in the pension fund model, you (at least in theory) don't need the next generation to pay: you save now so you get money later. In the more common model, you pay for the previous generation hoping that the next one will pay for you, and you need intergenerational agreement on what's a fair amount. You don't need that with the fund model, as you (usually) agree & know beforehand how much yo…

I think you missed the finer point that GP made: At the end of the day, somebody has to change that bedsheet. Consider this extreme edge case: If everybody is retired and no is is working, inflation goes to infinity and all those savings and stocks become worthless.

For sure, but there's a difference between a promise that someone will do it for you, and you having currency to exchange for doing so.

In the "having money" case, you have more options, but if you're given options, you also have more opportunity to make terrible decisions. And if it's a lump sum (or private investment of some kind), you can pass it on to your children - you can't do that with pensions in the other type.

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#294

Post by supernova87a »

bsaul wrote: post #123
AceJohnny2 wrote: post #87

The french pension reform attempts have been going on for decades . I remember in the mid-90s a huge, weeks- (months-?) long public transit strike which, funnily enough, kick-started Parisian's interest in roller-blading (and led to the awesome weekly Friday-night roller-blading tour [1]. If it's your thing, I highly recommend it! But be prepared to have to go over some cobblestone sections) France's system has the w…

baby boomers aren't retiring, they're dying . The pension system has already been through its worst period and managed to not get too badly hurt. I really don't understand this reform. However for me to understand it, one would need an 8 hour video stream full of spreadsheet with an actual expert working on that reform. And no media is ready to do that

I'm not sure where your facts (or opinions) are from.

There is a coming wave of retirees, and an associated decrease in the workers per retiree to support them.

https://www.ssa.gov/OACT/tr/2022/

See page 12, page 15.

If you both are not understanding the issue, and not interested in learning about the details, then maybe you shouldn't take a strong opinion on the matter.

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#295

Post by globalreset »

bsaul wrote: post #123
AceJohnny2 wrote: post #87

The french pension reform attempts have been going on for decades . I remember in the mid-90s a huge, weeks- (months-?) long public transit strike which, funnily enough, kick-started Parisian's interest in roller-blading (and led to the awesome weekly Friday-night roller-blading tour [1]. If it's your thing, I highly recommend it! But be prepared to have to go over some cobblestone sections) France's system has the w…

baby boomers aren't retiring, they're dying . The pension system has already been through its worst period and managed to not get too badly hurt. I really don't understand this reform. However for me to understand it, one would need an 8 hour video stream full of spreadsheet with an actual expert working on that reform. And no media is ready to do that

https://www.populationpyramid.net/france/2022/ doesn't look like it. The bulk of population just started going through the retirement age. Click -5 6 times, then start clicking +5 and watch how it moves.

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#296

Post by supernova87a »

76384638 wrote: post #276
supernova87a wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't say efficiently. I said fraud, which is a different thing. If you want to attack efficiency, you have a lot of work to deeply change how the government, and in fact many aspects of our public / government works. How they use contractors, the kinds of contracts they're allowed to enter into, the reviews and permitting and public commenting they need to engage in, unions, labor rates, etc. That would be as big…

Maybe I should not have said efficiently, as it really understates it. It's like if someone gets hired to work full time and then only works 20 minutes per week. Is that person committing fraud or just inefficient? What if the person gives part of their salary to their boss to look the other way? What if the person is a company, their boss is a politician, and the money is given to campaign organisation?

I don't know what case you're alluding to or what program that has such examples. But those examples sound like fraud and corruption.

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#297

Post by throwaway47201 »

strken wrote: post #265
rwmj wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is (so is the US). But ultimately productive value from workers must be transferred to retired people. How exactly that happens, whether through deferred spending power (ie savings/investments) or through direct payments, it has to happen. Although I admit that there being other countries in the world does change the calculus a bit; it would be possible (albeit weird and unsustainable) for everyone in France to be…

"From workers to retired people" implies at a casual reading that the worker and the retiree are not the same person, when in many systems the majority of what the worker pays goes directly to their own retirement. It's debatable whether paying into your own account is a transfer of wealth at all, even if you're not able to withdraw your money until retirement.

It's still all a clever scheme around the young looking after the old, numbers in an account wouldn't help us if everyone stopped having children today.

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#298

Post by noobermin »

ubercore wrote: post #275
retinaros wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

its normalizing but for the worst in developed economies. housing is now out of reach while decades ago a blue collar salary was enough,to own a house.(in the USA you can still get six digits blue collar jobs that lift you out of poverty and give you access to housing. in france that is merely a dream or a netflix show) today already for many qualified workers (tech for instance) staying in india vs coming to france…

Six figure blue collar jobs are not super common in the US.

It's not super common but it definitely is a thing...

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#299

Post by rootusrootus »

creato wrote: post #271
rootusrootus wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The top 3 chunks of spending After national defense, you mean. https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function

According to the link in the parent I replied to, social security and Medicare are larger, by more than 0.7%

Hmmm, so do I trust a media source, or the gov't themselves. Decisions, decisions!

Re: French workers protest plan to increase retirement age

#300

Post by realjhol »

Convolutional wrote: post #192
supernova87a wrote: post #156

One big challenge I see with the whole business about pension reform (and government spending in fact) as a public debate is that two sides are talking on totally different planes. In France, and someday very soon, here in the US. And the public in a certain sense, will problematically have to end up voting a simple yes/no on extremely complex topics which are incentivized to push buttons on single issues. cf. Brexit…

The US has spent $100 billion in the Ukraine over the past year, with more on the way, it is sending billions a year to Israel and Egypt, is involved in Iran, China, Venezuela etc. It just stopped spending a ton in Afghanistan. All the money spent there seemed to have no positive effect. The US seems to have money to throw all over the world for this kind of bloodthirsty waste, if it cuts it can cut there. People get…

Bizarre that you're getting down-voted.

Though the answer to your suggestions is that any populist conception of the American Empire is delusional. Like a mafia they will take your money and spend it in whatever way they damn well wish, and there's nothing you can do about it

Post reply on HN