Vive La Paralysis!

For the third time in three weeks, France is enjoying a national strike. Train conductors, garbage men, postal workers, the usual. (Unlucky travelers looking for up-to-date strike info should click here.) At issue this time around is a government proposal to chip away at the looming demographic time-bomb of a pension system by increasing the amount of time state employees must work before receiving full retirement benefits from 37.5 years to 40 years (same as the private sector). Teachers, who have some of the cushiest deals in the country, are threatening to cancel final exams later this week, after walking off and on the job since about April. Which means that students, who already have little chance of finding work, now don?t even have school to distract them. At least they can always go burn down a McDonald?s.