Solidarity Doesn't Mean Losing Money

Anyone who knows anything about France, knows that they love to strike here; and they love to support the strikers (although this has been changing in recent years). Bus strikes, train strikes and airport strikes, plus electricity and natural gas strikes are more or less the norm.

What is becoming more popular however in the last 10 years or so is disgruntled truck drivers blocking roads or gasoline depots. In 1997 there was a very bad strike where the European Union had to step in and tell the French government to work this out or there would be consequences on the supra-national level. Then in 2000 or 1999 they blocked the gasoline depots and France had to live without petrol for a couple of weeks. They tried again in 2001/2002 which led to great panic, but a much lower overall impact.

So fast forward to 2005. The price of a barrel of oil is hovering in the $70 range. Everyone is unhappy. The French government imposes some of the harshest taxes on petroleum products in the world and the truckers are pissed off. So they decide that they will not suffer alone (although I am still not sure how they think they are suffering alone - gasoline is an equal opportunity commodity). Anyway, they decide that if they have to pay too much for fuel, well no one should have it. They try to block the depots. They thought they would get support from the farmers and the fishermen in their trespassing and menancing of these depots. Well, they just choose the wrong time: Sébastien Pons of the organization Young Farmers said; "We are solidary with their action, but we are in the middle of the grape picking period. After the season, if the situation is still bad, we will wholeheartly put ourselves into the action."

"You can't actually expect us to hurt ourselves? Can you? Hell we have no problem blocking the roads and hurting the entire country, but pffht, you can't seriously think we'd do something to hurt us!!?!?!"

The cops came in and cleaned out the truckers after less than 24 hours of strike.

A little editorializing:
Yes, I realize that these guys get hurt by the increase in the price of fuel, but so do all the rest of us. It's a market economy, right? That's the point, when something is in short supply, or the supplies are threatened, it costs more. The truckers obviously use a lot of money on diesel - I don't know how the billing is done here, if they have to pay themselves (it wouldn't seem logical, I would think that the freight companies would be paying for the fuel - and they, in turn, would be passing it on to us, the consumers) it is obviously tough for them. Yeah, the farmers have it tough, they have to buy diesel too, but don't get me started on the French farmers and their government handouts. It hurts the fisherman as well, but I am sure that these groups can deduct this money from their tax returns. In any case, I am completely floored by the fact that this is accepted by the French; even if only by not doing anything against this. They allow their country to be held hostage by these protestors.

It is good news for the free-loving residents here that the authorities put an end to this before it got out of hand (I just hope that the farmers don't get angry after the grapes are picked and decide to take up arms as well...)