Forwarded mail received from: CENTER1:City:City.smtp:"[EMAIL PROTECTED]" x-posted from publabor list. An interesting little follow-up from the recent utopia discussion on pen-l.
12/10/1997 10:22 EST France May Go to 35-Hour Work Week PARIS (AP) -- France's leftist Cabinet adopted a measure calling for the work week to be reduced to 35 hours from 39 hours by the year 2000, despite protests by business leaders. A reduced work week, aimed at spreading jobs around to fight 12.5 percent unemployment, was a main plank in the Socialists' electoral platform in the legislative elections that brought them to power in June. A new poll released Wednesday indicated that 67 percent of the French would accept a 35-hour week with slightly lower pay if it would help create jobs in their company and industry. The survey, from the IFOP institute and published in the left-leaning daily Liberation, was taken over the phone Dec. 4-5 with 1,082 people aged 15 and older. No margin of error was given, but French polls of this size usually carry a margin of up to 3 percent. Prime Minister Lionel Jospin has stressed there should be negotiations between employers and workers on implementing the reduced work week. The government has already begun a publicity campaign to convince business leaders the shorter hours won't hurt French competitiveness. That campaign is being countered by the national business federation CNPF which vociferously opposed the change, contending it would simply raise labor costs. They demand instead that the government loosen up rigid labor laws and cut employment taxes. Under the plan, companies with over 20 employees would be required to reduce non-overtime hours to 35 by Jan. 1, 2000, while smaller companies would have until Jan. 1, 2002 to make the switch. Leading the conservative's opposition to the bill, President Jacques Chirac on Wednesday told the Cabinet: ``I don't think that this bill, taking into account its mandatory nature, is good for employment.'' The 35-hour work week bill will now be debated in parliament.
