French vote for dividend bonus c/d

http://www.lefigaro.fr/flash-eco/2011/07/13/97002-20110713FILWWW00447-le-parlement-vote-pour-la-prime-dividende.php

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/04/20/uk-france-prices-idUKTRE73J64V20110420

Any public company with more than 50 employees paying a larger dividend than the average of the past two years will have to pay their employees a bonus of around 700 Euros.

This is almost certainly a Sarkozy bid to shore up support on the Left ahead of next year's elections but I remain intrigued by this kind of social 'solidarity' thinking in more interventionist economies. Is this a good idea? A bad idea? Temporary electoral bullshit. An experiment that will end up like the 35 hour week? Quoi, alors?

Hard to find a lot about this on the ouèbe but it appears the companies will be free to negotiate the actual amount (?) and payroll taxes on any bonus under 1200 Euros will be exempted.

how did the 35 week end up!

It's still there but more widely criticized as a drag on competitiveness that didn't really lead to more jobs esp as Aubry (the author thereof) will likely be the Socialist pres candidate.

ok

Feel guilty now

Why?

had not heard about this, sounds like a good idea regardless of motivation.

in other news, i have heard that the dumbing down of libé continues apace - rothschild has installed two new managers who basically hate the paper and are instructing everyone to do more "lifestyle" stories

I haven't read libé in a while (though their cultural coverage is far ahead of the others). I'm just glad they're still alive at all.

cos i work 35 hours :)

Does Eire have a similar law?

public sector standard working week, tho the work practices are under scrutiny

Private sector is 40/week?

39 hr standard, tho 37.5 not unusual either iirc

yeah this is pretty sarko in a 'not really a right-wing or left-wing policy, just loud and strange' from the macro level this is basically hoping that more consumer spending is going to outweigh the increased cost of hiring people? there are better ways to fight unemployment.

this is basically hoping that more consumer spending is going to outweigh the increased cost of hiring people vote-wise

what % of people have a job that might get them a bonus? I don't know off hand but I thought the french economy had a lot more small biz + fonctionnaire jobs than people working for big corporations.

About a quarter of the private sector employees - around 4 million ppl

prob a relatively conservative group to begin with

yeah the more I think about it the more I think 'temporary electoral bullshit'

He might be buying them away from Le Pen.

is he really at risk in the first round? I haven't been paying attention to french news lately. cause le pen reaching the 2nd would be ideal for sarko.

He was doing so badly in the polls a month or so ago, it was thought she might make it before he did.

What is a "public company" in French terms? Does it mean something different from in the US (where it generally refers to a publicly traded corporation)?

Not 100% sure but if they're handing out dividends, I assume so.