We’re too apathetic in general.

The French have a social contract between generations, and workers actually pay pensions from their salary into a separate fund - ie not as PAYG.

So why are they angry? They don’t put with shit.

You gotta remember that 220 years ago they introduced democracy by overthrowing and guillotining their whole ruling class.

Real answer here: The French have social connections. They have large extended families and friends and they all hang out and eat bread or some shit. That’s where they talk about all this stuff. We have atomic families and slowly lose our friends and we barely talk about anything other than sport or drink. Our institutions like universities are built for profit. Our lifestyles are wire-thin, we work way too hard, and this means we don’t have the connective tissue to form a society; we’re just a bunch of individuals.

The age to get the Aged Pension is not the same thing as the retirement age. Our pension works as more of a safety net and top-up to Super, in France it is paid from the salary and expected to be the main income. We can access our Super from 60, and as the amount of time it has been compulsory (and the amount put in by employers) increases the age at which the pension is available becomes less relevant.

The retirement age didn’t go up, the age in which you can claim the aged pension went up, you can still retire at 65 and live on your superannuation if you want.

They’ve not been bludgeoned by the Murdoch press for decades telling them that business needs trump everything else. We couldn’t possibly increase taxes to pay for increased costs, it has to come from cuts.

Could it just be because the French are more angry than we are? They seem to love a violent protest.