In the family “honor”, Thomas Piketty refused the legion and administers the arm. That is not going to lessen the reputation of “rock star of the economy” that has built in recent months the author of “Capital in the twenty-first century.” After all, David Bowie and Keith Richards also refused to be knighted …
In any case, at the beginning of 2015, the new is rather pleasing, refreshing Similarly, no offense to grumpy denouncing the “mediocrity” of this gesture (Elie Cohen) or ironic about his absence “humility” (Thierry Mandon). By refusing napo-Republican charm, Piketty joined an honorable legion of free men: Aragon, Brassens, Sartre, Camus, Tardi … Or Godard, who had refused the Order of Merit by explaining that he had ” firstly, any merit and on the other hand, to take orders from anyone. “
Banderilla
With this bang, very rare in the middle economists Thomas Piketty marks independence, but not only: he takes the opportunity to plant a banderille in the back of Francois Hollande, following the wishes of the latter. The policy of the president remains in his view, erroneous and can still be changed. To justify his actions, he gave AFP a statement snipped in two points:
I refuse this appointment, because I do not think it is the role of government to decide who is honorable “.
They would do well to focus on reviving growth in France and Europe.”
The first verbatim the answer Edmond Maire, the former leader of the CFDT, who had also refused the Legion of Honour and dreamed of releasing the workings of society from the grip of the state. Although he advocates greater fiscal redistribution, the French statism does not the cup of tea Piketty.
The second point is a direct criticism of government action. Piketty does not lulled by the promise of a return to growth as a result of the drop of oil or the euro, nor by “markers left” Francois Hollande seeks to highlight (Act the hardship, discourse on immigration, removal of the first tranche of tax on income, family allowances reserved for smaller …).
What Piketty advocates for France Europe, the world
Egarement
The truth reminds us Piketty, is that the France continues to go wrong economically and there is no fatality in this error. We must act in France but especially “in Europe” where the real crux of the current slump. To read elsewhere, unscrew fiscal treaty negotiated under Sarkozy and ratified in Holland, beating down southern Europe; invest heavily in training, innovation and green technologies; pool the public debt …
Remember this is not useless, time or power diffuses the pretty music recovery-that-will-end-in-come. But as the economist explains in his latest column in “Liberation”, it may take a new shock to move the lines in 2015. What a shock? Nobody wants a new European financial crisis or push the nationalist right. A shock that would come from the left, then? Podemos of Spain or Syriza in Greece
And why not, suggests Piketty, which does not yet consider himself “left of the left”: at least these movements “are fundamentally internationalist and pro-European. ” It would be possible, relying on them to “formulate the outlines of a EU’s democratic overhaul,” he concludes. Chiche, Francois Hollande?
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