Why France sucks

[Bostech]

Lol,french opinion.

They find one woman with fake accent and call that french opinion.
She didnt say anything valuable except if you want to own business and be super rich USA is better,which is true.
For middle class France is way better.
Like I said,you have to deceide where do you belong and whats better for you.
USA is for rich and France is for middle class.

[samiam]

If you are interested in a WWII vintage rifle. The best condition are French, they have never been fired and only dropped once.

[Dog Walker]

France is a terrific country in most ways.  Not perfect, but as good as here at least and better in a number of respects.  People are a lot less stressed, countryside is a lot less trashed than ours, food is fabulous anywhere.  Medical care is absolutely fantastic.  Cardiac surgery and neurosurgery are in advance of what we are doing here. (personal knowledge).

Prices are much higher than here all over the country, not just in Paris.  Winter weather in Paris is about what we are having here today.  UGH! But this is the best time of year to visit Paris because there are no tourists there.

Parisians are much like New Yorkers; busy, sarcastic, proud and willing to help a stranger.  It really helps if you at least try to speak some French at first, but I find Parisians warm and funny. (But not the waiters in the summer!)

The graphic above is misleading in a way.  Much of the growth in earning in the last ten years or so in this country has gone to the top few percent of earners.  I think that now the French middle class is actually a bit better off than ours and there is no doubt that the working class is better off there.  No medical expenses to worry about.  No college funds to worry about.  No retirement worries.

Tougher to have a business there, but everyone seems to manage OK.  Every neighborhood has every kind of shop you could need, but France would be a very hard place in which to get rich. My French distributor based in Lyon, another fantastic city, has managed it.

Being born and raised in Jacksonville, I prefer it here, but could live in France after knocking the rust off of my French.  J'ai oublier tout mon vocabulair. (And French spelling is harder than English.)

[Bostech]

WD how many countries did you live/travel?
You seem to be knowledgeable about many places.

[Dog Walker]

Bos, I have NOT traveled or done business in Sub-Saharan Africa or in the "cone" of South America or in China, but have just about everywhere else with a few exceptions.  Long list.

Did LOTS of business in France and can get along in the language.

[reednavy]

Blah, blah, blah.

[buckethead]

France is lovely as are the French.

Believe it or not; people really are... people.

[Dog Walker]

Bucket, I have traveled enough to absolutely agree with you from first hand experience.  That's not an idealistic wish, it's the truth.

[Bostech]

Blah, blah, blah.

Imagine if French said all Americans are fat,uneducated people who carry guns around.
How true do you think that is?
Stereotypes that dont hold water.
Just like they say southerners are racists,but i actually seen more racists in NY then here.

Point of article is to introduce ideas for better living using France as example,not to fight over whos pee pee is bigger.
Just like a washer and dryer.
Americans got dryer part right and European washer,put it together and you got best of world.
All I am looking is what is better for my life and people that surround me.

If I have a car,I'll take European design,Japanese quality and American comfort.
I dont discriminate.

[NotNow]

I'd just as soon keep my own money and pay for my own comforts.  I think you will find that is a traditional American way of thinking.

[tufsu1]

I'd just as soon keep my own money and pay for my own comforts.  I think you will find that is a traditional American way of thinking.

maybe so...but it is also part of our problem....there are many things that can (and should be) funded by groups of people...like infrsatructure, protection, education, etc....but that doesn't go well with our me, me, me mindset.

[NotNow]

I prefer to think of what you call a "me, me, me mindset" as individual liberty.   It is (or was) the basis of our political system.   It doesn't take 70% of our income to protect us and build roads.  If people want to sit around for a year and enjoy the wine and roses, I don't want to pay for it.  I don't want to pay for the huge beuracracy required to administer it all either. 

We are attempting to abandon a system which has made our country one of the greatest economic powers in the history of the world.  We are attempting to embrace a system that has never worked for any period of time in the history of the world.  I am not an economist.  I don't pretend to be the smartest or most knowlegable guy on this forum.  But I can read history.  I don't see any reason to believe things will be different now.

[Bostech]

I prefer to think of what you call a "me, me, me mindset" as individual liberty.   It is (or was) the basis of our political system.   It doesn't take 70% of our income to protect us and build roads.  If people want to sit around for a year and enjoy the wine and roses, I don't want to pay for it.  I don't want to pay for the huge beuracracy required to administer it all either.  

We are attempting to abandon a system which has made our country one of the greatest economic powers in the history of the world.  We are attempting to embrace a system that has never worked for any period of time in the history of the world.  I am not an economist.  I don't pretend to be the smartest or most knowlegable guy on this forum.  But I can read history.  I don't see any reason to believe things will be different now.

Greatest economic power?Huh.
You mean by Federal Reserve printing money out of thin air?
You mean in modern times?
Do you also take in account that you have greatest debt too?

So If I borrow million dollars that makes me a millionaire??
I can walk around and act like one,except one day you have to pay that money back.
Same with US,which borrows money and eventually you will have to pay that back.

Middle class in France has more then middle class in US,unless you include "debt" as wealth.

[Sportmotor]

Would you guys stop feeding the troll. lol

[cybertique]

Here's another reason, an excerpt from the Daily Beast says it best:

As Haitians lurch destitute in the rubble, and as governments, churches, and NGOs do the best they can to bring succor to Haiti's hell, a vivid solution to the country's needs presents itself, one so obvious and irrefutableâ€"so resonantly justâ€"that it must be advocated with the greatest of energy: France must repay its colonialist debt to Haiti by paying for much of the island country’s reconstruction.
Haiti's chronic impoverishment began at its birth in 1804, when, having overthrown its French rulers in a bloody, 12-year slave revolt, the newborn nation was subjected to crippling blockades and embargoes. This economic strangulation continued until 1825, when France offered to lift embargoes and recognize the Haitian Republic if the latter would pay restitution to Franceâ€"for loss of property in Haiti, including slavesâ€"of 150 million gold francs. The sum, about five times Haiti's export revenue for 1825, was brutal, but Haiti had no choice: Pay up or perish over many more years of economic embargo, not to mention face French threats of invasion and reconquest. To pay, Haiti borrowed money at usurious rates from France, and did not finish paying off its debt until 1947, by which time its fate as the Western Hemisphere's poorest country had been well and truly sealed.


Here is the link to the article:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-01-14/why-haitis-earthquake-is-frances-problem/