The day after French President Emmanuel Macron said that, in the year 2027 alone, he would blow another roughly €60 billion on weapons for some fantasy war with Russia that France isn’t even in, the French prime minister proposed axing some statutory holidays in an effort to balance the books.

Dude just hit a third rail and electrocuted his political career. There are two things the French hold sacred. The first is their sprawling social safety net, which they fund with sky-high taxes and from which they get diminishing returns. And the other is their numerous beloved paid vacation days. Macron’s handpicked prime minister, longtime establishment centrist fixture François Bayrou, has chosen to mess with the one thing that unites the nation more than even football: their time off.

Why would he want to do that? So the French can work more. So the activity generated can be taxed. Because the government is super broke. Bayrou says that he has to find another €44 billion in the state’s couch cushions to keep France’s ballooning debt and borrowing costs from setting off more investor panic and bond-dumping. Normally, the government doesn’t even touch the budget until September, when legislators return from their sacred summer break, which of course they’re not being asked to sacrifice in the interests of austerity. But Bayrou says that he wants to get a head start because the public needs........

© RT.com