Aux armes, citoyens. La patrie en danger. France is losing its triple-A status. If the French are honest, they should seize on expulsion from the club to do some clear thinking.
Moody’s cut its top rating late on Monday, following a similar move by Standard & Poor’s in January. The main reason is France’s “gradual, sustained loss of competitiveness and the longstanding rigidities of its labour, goods and service markets”. That is pretty damning – but it is surely not news to the French.
France’s benchmark is Germany, yet most comparison indicators are pointing in the wrong direction. The French are (rightly) proud of their industries, yet industry’s share of gross value added has fallen by more than 5 percentage points to 12.5 per cent since the launch of the euro, according to Citi research, compared with a 1 percentage point gain in Germany. Employee costs are two-thirds of profits at French companies, compared with 60 per cent at their German competitors. That fact is not reflected in stock market returns, however – German and French stocks have performed roughly in line over five years.