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I find this an embarrassingly entertaining read! I particularly like this bit: “The French are not up-to-date. They’re not modern. They’re living in the past."

I find this an embarrassingly entertaining read! I particularly like this bit: “The French are not up-to-date. They’re not modern. They’re living in the past." “… The World Almanac for 1945 concludes that as far as social legislation is concerned, "France is in the vanguard" .. The French were certainly up-to-date in establishing old age pensions, compulsory insurance against illness, disability and death, maternity insurance, and so on. It was France that introduced the forty-hour work week.” Clearly the author views theses social policies positively. I wander if that was what the average American thought back in 45.

ekianjo 5y ago
Nobody worked 40 hours weeks after the war in France, except maybe civil servants.
- fcantournet 5y ago
  That's not the point. It never was the point, it's never been the point of ANY law about ANY duration of the work week. It defines the LEGAL duration of a week's work because that's going to be used for calculating the PAY. Wehn we went from 39h -> 35h for instance with the same pay, we're just compensating for the massive increases in productivity that occured while salaries stayed flat for 30 years. And civil servants basically work the same hours per year as workers in the private sector, in France. Always have since 1945. In 2019 it was 1640h vs 1703h effective hours per years, a 3.8% difference.
  - ekianjo 5y ago
    > And civil servants basically work the same hours per year as workers in the private sector, in France. Not, not at all. They retire many years before the private sector and have way more vacation. You forgot that tiny detail.
Archelaos 5y ago
> Clearly the author views theses social policies positively. I wander if that was what the average American thought back in 45. Probably most of those who voted for Roosevelt in 1944 and some others who voted for Dewey for other reasons. The results of Roosevelt's New Deal led to a comparatively wide support of social policies in the US for decades.
rsynnott 5y ago
The US established basic social insurance in the 30s, and generally ~all industrialised nations were going in this direction in the era fairly uncontroversially; at the time I don’t think it was particularly contentious. The idea that social welfare is a partisan issue, with one side considering it to be, essentially, a bad thing, is really a fairly modern invention in the US; Reagan era.

ekianjo 5y ago

Nobody worked 40 hours weeks after the war in France, except maybe civil servants.

fcantournet 5y ago
That's not the point. It never was the point, it's never been the point of ANY law about ANY duration of the work week. It defines the LEGAL duration of a week's work because that's going to be used for calculating the PAY. Wehn we went from 39h -> 35h for instance with the same pay, we're just compensating for the massive increases in productivity that occured while salaries stayed flat for 30 years. And civil servants basically work the same hours per year as workers in the private sector, in France. Always have since 1945. In 2019 it was 1640h vs 1703h effective hours per years, a 3.8% difference.
- ekianjo 5y ago
  > And civil servants basically work the same hours per year as workers in the private sector, in France. Not, not at all. They retire many years before the private sector and have way more vacation. You forgot that tiny detail.

Archelaos 5y ago

> Clearly the author views theses social policies positively. I wander if that was what the average American thought back in 45. Probably most of those who voted for Roosevelt in 1944 and some others who voted for Dewey for other reasons. The results of Roosevelt's New Deal led to a comparatively wide support of social policies in the US for decades.

rsynnott 5y ago

The US established basic social insurance in the 30s, and generally ~all industrialised nations were going in this direction in the era fairly uncontroversially; at the time I don’t think it was particularly contentious. The idea that social welfare is a partisan issue, with one side considering it to be, essentially, a bad thing, is really a fairly modern invention in the US; Reagan era.