This is the Cato Daily Podcast for Wednesday, September 8, 2010.

I'm Caleb Brown.

France's pension for lavish government pensions has parallels in U.S. states, early retirement

ages, a strike-ready government workforce, and a fiscal train wreck down the tracks.

Dan Mitchell, Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, Commons.

This is a very telling paragraph.

This is from the Wall Street Journal.

A poll released by French Weekly, La Point Monday showed 62% of respondents support the protest

and think the government needs to make some concessions, but nearly half of those questioned

favored lifting the retirement age to 62.

The retirement age going up to 62 in France.

I think this is part of the political culture of a welfare state that basically describes what happens when people

get accustomed to the idea that government should take care of them, provide for their needs.

Then you get into these bizarre scenarios like we have in Greece and like we now have in France,

where very, very modest changes are seen as being radical even if objectively people realize well

okay we're living now to 80 years old maybe we shouldn't be retiring at 60 maybe

62 is more reasonable the people in France are just used to the idea that they have some sort

of entitlement or right to having other people provide for them, even if it means ludicrous things

like retiring at age 60.

And for the government to make plans for the spending that it actually does need to do for the future,

having a no longer active workforce that is at that point purely a drain and

politicians who can make promises without having to actually be around when those bills come due, it almost seems

...