France has had three Prime Ministers this year. Michel Barnier lost a vote of no confidence just four months into his premiership after proposing spending cuts. Francois Bayrou lasted a bit longer, but he too lost a vote of no confidence over pension reform.
Macron then appointed Sebatien Lecornu, who resigned after 27 days when he realised he couldn't get his budget through. Macron then reappointed him - and Lecornu announced he was shelving pension reform to get the budget through. This was clearly a condition for him accepting the job a second time.
This is a great victory for the far-left and far-right who between them represent the majority of French voters. And those voters are adamant that there must be no pension reform.
Yet France is in serious trouble. Take a look at the following chart. On the left is French GDP as a percentage of Eurozone GDP; on the right is French debt as a percentage of eurozone debt:
In absolute numbers, French debt is the highest in Europe. And they're running a budget deficit of nearly 6% of GDP.
Surely any voter looking at the above charts would be alarmed. The Italians swallowed bitter spending cuts and are running a primary surplus. Then again, the Italians have never defaulted on their debt, they even paid their war debts unlike the Germans. They are a pragmatic people.
French citizens on the other hand are gambling that they'll be bailed out "because they're France" in Juncker's famous words. After all the EU has always given them a pass for budget deficits even while they came down hard against other countries.
Are they wrong?