Apparently you know our politics better than we do

I spend too much time researching things and France is a uniquely entertaining putain! merci beaucoup! I waste many hours reading about it

Bayrou is a former prime minister, vastly responsible for the current situation.

He was only in for like 3 months wasn't he? Macron's failed snap election fuck up gave rise to what is uniquely french, 3 incompetent political parties ruining your country all at once! :D I loved it how you couldn't agree on budget cuts, left and right kept joining up to delete prime ministers, so dumb :D

I will try to be short but essentially you are not addressing the core issue, I've seen other french people doing this same dance, you always seem to avoid the harsh reality that you cannot spend what you don't have

Proper wealth redistribution

You've tried it before, remember how well it went?

“The reform clearly damaged France’s reputation and competitiveness,” said Jorg Stegemann, the head of the executive search firm Kennedy Executive. “It clearly has become harder to attract international senior managers to come to France than it was.”

Finance ministry studies showed that despite all the publicity, the sums obtained from the supertax were meagre, standing at €260m in 2013 and €160m in 2014, and affecting 1,000 staff in 470 companies. Over the same period, the budget deficit soared to €84.7bn.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/31/france-drops-75percent-supertax

etcetc

https://qz.com/279900/a-short-history-of-frances-battles-over-taxing-the-wealthy

etcetc

You are but one country that has tried many times to tax the rich to save the country, most of the time the country has to give up and simply reduce spending somehow

A bit like: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-08-18/ndis-changes-pass-after-labor-strikes-deal-with-coalition/107051964

The Coalition voted with Labor in the Senate on Tuesday evening to pass the sweeping changes, which are intended to curb the structural bloat of a scheme that costs more than $50 billion annually.

The overhaul is expected to save an estimated $37.8 billion over the next four years alone.

We are also going into debt so we are reducing our outgoings, this is how a normal government functions

It appears that France has largely covered its eyes for the last 40 years instead

With proper taxation and redistribution we can largely afford to keep our retirement age at 60. Yes, the system needs to change to make it fair for everyone, and that will include cutting spending for richer retirees. But in no way raising retirement age is an absolute necessity.

Most pension ages around the world are going up based on the simple economics

More older people = higher government costs (pensions/healthcare)

Less young people = lower government income (less workers/less tax)

Not a complicated scenario but apparently the french are unique and know something we all don't

Our spending is high but stable and has been somewhat stable for the past 50 years,

High and Stable and also unsustainable !

You seem to be confused. What made you think that I said anything about "money is what constrains an economy", I have strictly been speaking about government spending.

Far-right Le Pen showed in a quite funny press conference their plan to make 15.1 billions of economy by fighting immigration. The details of the plan are absolutely absent.

Yes, you currently have 3 clown shows at once, maybe even 4 if you include the french people (sorry)

I was just reading this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1995_strikes_in_France

The main grievances for the railway workers were the loss of the right to retire at age 55

1 MILLION people protesting for this craziness!

In 1995 french people protested and demanded the right to retire at 55 knowing that in 30 years (2025!) you'd STILL be paying those same workers (who haven't worked since 1995!) and those who are now 86+ are STILL being paid since 1995 all the way through till today despite not working!

Even worse, they are being paid more than they made when they were working, you see the issue?

More older people = higher government costs (pensions/healthcare)

Less young people = lower government income (less workers/less tax)

Where is all this money to pay the pensioners supposed to come from?

Meanwhile in Australia 3 years earlier:

The 1992 Superannuation Guarantee landed roughly 19 years before the first baby boomers hit 65 in 2011, and about 30 years before peak ageing pressure. The World Bank effectively endorsed Australia's three-pillar model as world's best practice in its 1994 report Averting the Old Age Crisis. (Treasury, Parliamentary Library)

Every pay some of our money goes towards a 'super fund', they invest the money, and then when we are 67 and retire we get all the investment money back so we don't rely on the government and pension (and even still our pensions are still massive! the biggest part of our budget as well!)

Rich have the same living basic need as the poor (they are all humans) yet, they prefer to keep it for themself

That's not true, that's a fairy tale :P

They do investment with it, the build factories, invest in startups, invest in the stock market, send it over to America and invest in their companies :P

To the debt he added 1000 billion. Yet schools, hospitals, public services, roads are in worse shape than ever. Where did the money go?

Ask the pensioners :P

You create jobs and you have direct materials conditions. More houses, more renewable electricity, insulated houses, more teachers.

Right but you don't get back 100% of the returns, so Melonhead says lets invest 1 billion into housing! Great! How much is the government getting back in taxes? 30% 40%? maybe even 50%? but this does not pay down their spending or the debt (it makes it worse)

So as you cannot spend money you do not have and now with your debt problem you cannot borrow money either without pain he will increase taxes even further:

The revenue proposals represent an all-out assault on wealth and capital. The plan includes a climate-focused wealth tax raising 10 billion euros, elimination of the flat tax on capital gains worth 9 billion, a Zucman tax on ultra-high-net-worth individuals generating 15 billion, increased inheritance taxes yielding 20 billion, and the removal of tax exemptions worth 22 billion. Additional levies would target cryptocurrencies, excess profits, technology giants, financial transactions, and share buybacks.

https://newsfire.gr/en/french-flee-as-melenchon-unveils-radical-2027-budget-plan/

a Zucman tax on ultra-high-net-worth individuals generating 15 billion, increased inheritance taxes yielding 20 billion, and the removal of tax exemptions worth 22 billion.

Wow! This will generate 57 billion dollars! Amazing!

DEBT INTEREST PAYMENTS State expenditure on interest payments on the public debt in 2026 61 995 943 958 €

https://horloge-de-la-dette-publique.com/en/debt-clock-france-national-debt-real-time/

So this will not even pay for 1 year of interest on your current debt, let alone the other 3.6 TRILLION Euros of debt and even better, it will piss everyone who is rich off, they will not hang around to pay all this money out, they will move

Fiscal stimulus (like during covid) can be good to starve off a recession but someone has to pay the bill sooner or later, and that is coming soon for France, I will try to watch your election live, it will be very interesting!

I am quite sorry xD at the end in my politics everything is linked, values included.

We have the same thing in Australia, our Labor party was part of those values, I also appreciate those values but at this point it feels like we have gone beyond the basics (women can vote) and now it is into madness (the government should pay me money for half my life)