EconomPic : devenir français ?

En raison d’une chute du nombre d’heures travaillées plus rapide que celle du PIB, le ratio du PIB par Heure travaillée s’envole.

Travaillez moins, soyez plus productif, et passez ce temps libre avec votre famille.

Bien que cela ne résulte pas nécessairement d’un choix, après avoir lu l’article de juillet 2005 de Krugman titré "valeurs familiales françaises", je me demande si nous sommes en train de devenir doucement (ou devrions devenir) français.

Krugman : valeurs familiales françaises (2005)

... a head-to-head comparison between the economies of the United States and Europe - France, in particular - shows that the big difference is in priorities, not performance. ... according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, productivity in France - G.D.P. per hour worked - is actually a bit higher than in the United States. ....

The French family, without question, has lower disposable income. This translates into lower personal consumption : a smaller car, a smaller house, less eating out.

But there are compensations for this lower level of consumption. Because French schools are good across the country, the French family doesn’t have to worry as much about getting its children into a good school district. Nor does the French family, with guaranteed access to excellent health care, have to worry about losing health insurance or being driven into bankruptcy by medical bills.

Perhaps even more important, however, the members of that French family are compensated for their lower income with much more time together. Fully employed French workers average about seven weeks of paid vacation a year. In America, that figure is less than four.

I’ve been looking at a new study of international differences in working hours by Alberto Alesina and Edward Glaeser, at Harvard, and Bruce Sacerdote, at Dartmouth. The study’s main point is that differences in government regulations, rather than culture (or taxes), explain why Europeans work less than Americans.

But the study also suggests that in this case, government regulations actually allow people to make a desirable tradeoff - to modestly lower income in return for more time with friends and family ... And they even offer some statistical evidence that working fewer hours makes Europeans happier, despite the loss of potential income.

Krugman : leçons européennes

Europe has its economic troubles ; who doesn’t ? But the story you hear all the time - of a stagnant economy in which high taxes and generous social benefits have undermined incentives, stalling growth and innovation - bears little resemblance to the surprisingly positive facts. The real lesson from Europe is actually the opposite of what conservatives claim : Europe is an economic success, and that success shows that social democracy works.

...

Europe is often held up as a cautionary tale, a demonstration that if you try to make the economy less brutal, to take better care of your fellow citizens when they’re down on their luck, you end up killing economic progress. But what European experience actually demonstrates is the opposite : social justice and progress can go hand in hand.

La récession transforme le mode de vie des américains

Because of the Great Recession, a recent New York Times/CBS News poll has found, nearly half of Americans said they were spending less time buying nonessentials, and more than half are spending less money in stores and online.

But Americans are not just getting by with less. They are also doing more.

Some are working longer hours, but a larger proportion, the poll shows, are spending additional time with family and friends, gardening, cooking, reading, watching television and engaging in other hobbies.

Johann Hari : en finir avec la culture du surtravail

....

the treadmill is whirling ever-faster. This isn’t our choice : virtually every study ... finds that huge majorities of people say they want to work less and spend more time with their friends, their families and their thoughts. We know it’s bad for us. Professor Cary Cooper, who has studied to effects of overwork on the human body, says : "If you work consistently long hours, more than 45 a week, every week, it will damage your health, physically and psychologically." You become 37 per cent more likely to suffer a stroke or heart-attack if you work 60 hours a week - yet one in six of all Brits are doing just that.

We don’t stop primarily because we are locked in an arms race with out colleagues. If we relax and become more human, we fall behind the person in the next booth down, who is chasing faster. ...

Under Prime Minister Lionel Jospin in the 1990s, the French discovered the most elegant way out of this .... They insisted that everyone work a maximum of 35 paid hours a week. It was a way of saying : in a rich country, life is about more than serving corporations and slogging. Wealth generation and consumerism should be our slaves, not our masters : where they make us happy, we should embrace them ; where they make us miserable, we should cast them aside. Enjoy yourself. True wealth lies not only in having enough, but in having the time to enjoy everything and everyone around you.

It was the equivalent to an arms treaty : we all stop, together, now, at the 35 hour mark. The French population became fitter, their relationships were less likely to break down, their children became considerably happier, and voluntary organisations came back to life. According to the national statistics agency Insee, the policy created 350,000 jobs, because so many people moved to job-shares to ensure their post was filled five days a week. ...

From the unlikely pairing of Salt Lake City and Paris, a voice is calling. It is telling us that if we leave our offices empty a little more, we can find a happier, healthier alternative lying in the great free spaces beyond.

La situation de l’emploi continue de se dégrader aux USA avec 85 000 emplois perdus en décembre.

Taux de chômage

Population active/population en âge de travailler

Comparaison de l’évolution du chômage durant les récessions

La décennie perdue

Progression du PIB et du patrimoine net des ménages par décennie entre 1940 et 2000.

source

Lire aussi :

  Washington Post : The lost decade for the economy

  Krugman : Zéro pointé

from an economic point of view, I’d suggest that we call the decade past the Big Zero. ... It was a decade with basically zero job creation. ... It was a decade with zero economic gains for the typical family. Actually, even at the height of the alleged “Bush boom,” in 2007, median household income adjusted for inflation was lower than it had been in 1999. And you know what happened next.

Le taux d’épargne net aux USA est négatif pour la première fois depuis la dépression des années trente

Le taux d’épargne des ménages est redevenu positif, mais l’endettement global, tous secteurs confondus, continue d’augmenter.

source

Bloomberg : Government deficits have caused the U.S. savings rate to turn negative for the first time since the Great Depression, and the gap is widening even as households and companies put away more money than ever before.

The CHART OF THE DAY shows net savings, adjusted for depreciation and changes in the value of business inventories, as a percentage of gross income. This rate is provided by the Commerce Department on a quarterly basis since 1947, when the chart begins. Annual figures go back to 1929.

La dette américaine ne sera jamais remboursée à sa valeur actuelle.

La relation chômage/inflation et le NAIRU mis à l’épreuve des faits

Roger Farmer "Farewell to the natural rate : Why unemployment persists." argues that "the relationship between unemployment and inflation is more complicated than that suggested by simple new-Keynesian models that incorporate a “natural rate” of unemployment."

Extrait : Most policymakers subscribe to the theory of the existence of a natural rate of unemployment. The data suggest that this theory is unconfirmed at best. To make the theory consistent with data, one must posit that the natural rate changes between recessions in unpredictable ways. This version of natural rate theory is difficult or impossible to refute. It is religion, not science.

Rappelons que ce modèle que Farmer qualifie de croyance religieuse sert de règle de base à tous les banquiers centraux.