ERealizing in Sciences Po Bordeaux, Timothée Duverger is responsible for the Chair Territories of the Social and Solidarity Economy. He is also a researcher at the Émile-Durkheim Center and president of the Observatory of Zero Long Term territories.
Historian, researcher, Thimothée Duverger is a teacher at Sciences Po Bordeaux.
With 11 holidays, is France an exception in Europe?
No, France is even below the European average which is 12.07 days. Easter Monday, which François Bayrou proposes, is celebrated in around thirty countries around the world. Beyond that, public holidays, mixing religious festivals and historical events, embody two particular fields and especially two very distinct camps also when it comes to defending them.
In 2004, after the historic heat wave of 2003, Jean-Pierre Raffarin also suppressed a public holiday, by making Pentecost Monday a day of solidarity with the elderly. What assessment?
First, as today, this proposal had triggered a controversy. But the implementation of this measure mainly gave rise to multiple bypass. The logic of this day of solidarity to finance age policies has diluted. So much so that in 2008, Nicolas Sarkozy gave Pentecost on Monday his holiday character. It was therefore not a great success.
“The degradation of working conditions cannot be denied”
François Bayrou targets two holidays: Easter Monday and May 8. A religious holiday and a historical date. A skillful consensus?
By choosing a religious holiday and a historical date, it puts the two camps on the back. The extreme right will oppose the questioning of the holiday character of Easter Monday, in the name of the supposed Christian roots of France, and the left will also oppose the social character of public holidays. He has just taken his feet in the carpet.
History has however shown that May 8, which was released in 1953, is not untouchable …
Yes. May 8 lost its holiday in 1959 on the initiative of General de Gaulle. The liberator of France wanted to turn the page on war, the defeat of Germany, and begin reconciliation. Valéry Giscard d’Estaing will also remove the commemorations of 8-May. It was François Mitterrand, in 1981, who returned his holiday in May 8.
I remind you that Easter Monday has also evolved. Napoleon brought Easter week to a single public holiday.
“May 8, it is also the defeat of Nazism, we cannot neglect it”
May 8 also marks the end of the Second World War. With the war in Ukraine, at the gates of Europe, it is not neutral either …
Yes, May 8, it is also the defeat of Nazism, in the context of today, with the rise of populisms, we cannot neglect this historical reading. To delete the public character of May 8 is a political fault.
For employees, the abolition of two holidays will have the consequence of working for two more days without being paid …
Materially, that’s it. A public holiday is like an additional day of leave. Employees do not work but they are paid. Besides, when the holiday falls on a vacation day, we count it. The objective of the measurement is to work more.
“Taking on public holidays is to tackle 30 million assets”
These two public holidays would bring state funds to 4.2 billion euros. Or double the expected contribution of the richest to this budgetary effort. Does that explain the feeling of injustice?
In this draft budget, there is no question of returning to the tax gifts made to companies, nor to the supply policy that Emmanuel Macron conducted. Which raises the question of tax equity. A third of debt since 2017, these have been tax gifts to businesses. In July, the Senate issued a report which shows that in 2023, large companies benefited from 211 billion euros in public aid. Aid very little targeted and without too many counterparts. Likewise, the government does not want a Zucman tax, which would make it possible to establish a wealthy heritage tax. Admittedly, it would not settle everything, but it would give off revenue. Given the reaction of employees, who will lose two holidays, is understandable.
These are the assets that will be concerned, it is potentially explosive …
Tackling public holidays is tackling the assets. And that makes people: almost 30 million people, it represents almost half of the French. You have to replace yourself in a broader context. France has experienced a long social conquest, that of reducing working time with both the weekly work reduction and the establishment of paid holidays. However, for the past twenty years, this story has been stopped. With, above all, a phenomenon that is documented today: the degradation of working conditions. The mobilization against the pension reform is also explained by this reality. Many employees end their careers with difficulty, if they are not unemployed. Deleting two holidays is playing with fire.
François Bayrou believes that “France does not work enough and does not produce enough”. Does France have a problem with work?
This rhetoric is nothing new. It is even quite dated. These are always the same common places that we tighten to pass these measures. The Economic Analysis Council, which provides data to the government, has shown it and I quote it: “The difference in the number of hours worked per capita compared to our European neighbors is fully explained by the low French employment rate and not by the average number of hours of work per person in employment. It seems to me that it is clear. It is also necessary to distinguish the legal duration of work, from the effective duration of work. Because the 35 hours are not for everyone and are cheerfully bypassed. I was talking about seniors right now, but let’s look at the young people. Their employment rate is lower in France than elsewhere. Our young people are not lazy, but their entry into the world of work is complicated. And we cannot say that they take advantage of social policies since they do not have access to the RSA … Afterwards, we can also, as certain republican states in the United States demand, make children work.
