France has high taxes, but at the same time provides more services than other countries: free education including higher education, free healthcare, generous unemployment package, etc. Even more, this is done without closing the door to immigration.

Regarding the current movement which started with taxes on gas, the tax raise is insignificant vs. the actual oil price increase. Read this article (in French) for more information: https://www.lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/article/2018/11/09/peti...

Also, the people who go into the protests to break cars and shops have nothing to do with the original movement. Some clearly came to loot shops (if you are anarchist, you want to burn luxury clothing items, not take them), some are anarchists who came to fight police forces, etc.

Taxes on gasoline make up 50% of the price.

To pretend that the increase in taxes is there to help pay for renewable energies is a joke.

It's not a secret that the government is broke and looking to raise money any way it can.

It's trying to pass this tax increase as something that needs to be done to save the planet.

But they dont tax the fuel for tankers or airplanes so where is the logic?

It's not the little guy with his diesel car that does most of the damage to the environment.

> But they dont tax the fuel for tankers or airplanes so where is the logic?

Can they ? The only thing that will happen is no plane or tanker will buy fuel in France if it is not a decision made on an international level, no ?

I think that planes refuel at each trip. They wouldn’t have the choice.

It is. 40% of french emissions are due to personal transportation (cars), 8% airplanes.

This is a very idealized version of reality. France also has high unemployment, especially amongst youth and immigrants, migrant camps popping up, civil unrest, many regions where the economy is going to shit and industries are disappearing, etc...

You need to pay the taxes, your expenses and then you may use what the state provides. If you raise taxes and fees by X% for a few years and wages stagnate, people might forget the free education, since they can't pay their rent.

I like the European tradition, it gets their attention, and messing with people's bread and butter is a cause to rise up

No one gives a fuck about services if you can’t get some bread.

you don't know what you are talking about.

> Macron comes off as a privileged president that has no clue about what his citizens are going through.

Macron is a neoliberal, it was obvious things were going to end badly. Yeah raise the gas tax, cut pensions and let the free market solve everything. Doesn't work with public policy.

It was depressing seeing Mélenchon come in third in 2017.

What is depressing is seeing French people think the situation would be better with Mélenchon who has great admiration for Chavez and Maduro.

France has a huge debt. This guy's policy would worsen the situation very quickly.

France is the 2nd country in the world with the most public expenses after Finland (data.oecd.org/gga/general-government-spending.htm).

And Melenchon says that liberalism doesn't work, we should just follow the path of communist countries. But France never applied liberal policies and we have all seen the results of communist policies.

I’m curious how France deals with the populist candidate who rises to power from Macron’s tone deaf policies.

>struggling to make ends meet

French wages are on average ~8x higher compared to the post 2000 join date EU countries, prices are same across EU.

Source? I don’t think you are correct. I’m French living in the US. Median net income is around 1,700 euro. Most people I know make around 1300-1900. And many retired are bellow 1k euro... People are pissed because they are struggling, and have nothing left at the end of the month. Politicians keep rising taxes, while cutting it for the rich.

Prices aren't the same across EU. There are already different across France. Life is more expensive in Paris than in any other French city for example.

Tell that to the millions of retired people and people making minimum wage with less than 1200 euros per month to live with a rent of 600-700 euros.