French President, François Hollande has sought to rework the economics of the nation and has drafted a €2 billion ($2.2 billion) job creation plan to help the country tide over what he called a state of "economic emergency."
Hollande said that France was facing an "uncertain economic climate and persistent unemployment" in addition to an "economic and social emergency. These €2 billion will be financed without any new taxes of any kind. Our country has been faced with structural unemployment for two to three decades and this requires that creating jobs becomes our one and only fight," said Hollande, announcing the plan while interacting with business leaders, reports BBC.
According to the plan, Hollande has announced that companies with less than 250 employees could be eligible for an incentive of 2,000 euro for each new employee with a contract of more than six months, if the new employee were young or unemployed. Hollande also announced the creation of 500,000 vocational training schemes.
The opposition leaders and French media remained unimpressed. Jean-Christophe Lagarde, of the centrist UDI party, thought the plans were "an insult to whitewash" with regard to solving the unemployment problem.
"The state is not in a position to suddenly put 500,000 people into training in less than a year. The training organizations don't exist, there aren't any trainers, and there isn't enough money. It is an insult to those people who live the reality of being unemployed. The unemployed are not mere statistics that can be massaged for political benefit," Lagarde said, according to France 24.
"Hollande once again risks disappointing those people who need him to break down France's taboos and to take shock measure such as relaxing France's employment laws," wrote the financial daily Les Echos criticising the president's plans, reports France 24.
"What planet are François Hollande and his government living on if they think it is enough to write a che[ck] of 1,000 or 2,000 euros to a company that takes someone on?" said the Republican party's Guillaume Larrive, criticising Hollande, according to AFP.
