The reader will not find in this booklet “the means to earn more by working less”, but he will know how to rebuild a society based on work, allowing both to live better and to acquire a patrimony. The author notes that labor productivity has declined since the 1980s, due to the country’s deindustrialization and the weakening of skills due to educational downgrading. He recalls that France was downgraded from the 6th to the 27th place in the world ranking of GDP per capita. He notes that the purchasing power of the French is no longer progressing and that two-thirds of their wealth comes from inheritances. The French who do not work live better than those who do. Work only supports purchasing power through social assistance in all forms. The progressivity of taxes and contributions financing these aids also discourages employees from working overtime and employers from recruiting and/or increasing the wages of their employees. Workers retain, on average, only half of their gross earnings, while rentiers receive one third, pensioners one sixth, and heirs less than one tenth. This results in different forms of resistance to work, which mobilize more protesters than other social conflicts, encourage sick leave, “silent resignations” and/or rejections of “bullshit jobs”. In 2025, the working population must also support twice as many retirees as in 1980. According to the author, this phenomenon is due to an unequal distribution of the value created by labor, which favors both financial and real estate capital.
The French no longer believe in the “collective discourse” that orders them to get back to work. The author therefore strives to propose a new “social contract” aimed at bridging the gap between the living standards of workers, rentiers, retirees, and heirs. He proposes measures to enhance the value of work and the purchasing power of assets through better remuneration, thanks to more professional training, a revival of innovation (especially through AI), a reindustrialization of the country associated with a limitation of imports of dumped products, a more flexible employment and greater professional mobility. He advocates a “revenge of employees on customers”, by redistributing VAT rates in favor of basic necessities. He advises building a “new ideal of work”, based on the values of responsibility, respect, and empathy.
The author engages in a rigorous and educational exercise of analyzing the French evil of professional attrition and formulates coherent proposals to deal with it.
Antoine Foucher was director of the cabinet of a minister of labor. He currently heads the consulting firm Quintet.
Jean-Jacques Pluchart