Raising the minimum wage, relief for the poorest retirees and tax relief on overtime: in the end, Emmanuel Macron had to give in. And after suspending the controversial carbon tax, which unleashed the revolt in deep France, first on social media and then - for four Saturdays in a row - in the streets of central Paris, with devastation and thousands of injured and arrested, the French president also decided, live on national radio and television broadcast at 20 pm on Monday, to still concede something to the violent protest of the gilets jaunes. A protest that started with a Facebook event created by a young motorist, followed by a video clicked on by millions and millions of people on YouTube and which went viral, and finally by a campaign launched on Change.org which has already collected over a million signatures, to then lead to the streets, where, however, the gilets jaunes (including the violent infiltrators) were much less, at most around 150.000. The problem, for Macron, is that according to the polls 70% of all French, even of those who do not participate in the movement, he agrees with them.
To the point that, again according to pollsters, what increasingly resembles a French 5 Star Movement (born on the web, from transversal and proudly apolitical consensus) it would already be the fourth most voted party in France, if it were to present itself at the European elections next May: it would obtain 12% of the votes, still far from the 21% of La Republique en Marche, the party of Macron's nation, but in a tussle with Marine Le Pen, given around 14% ( and which would be the most penalized by the eventual formation of a new party), the ecologists around 13%, the centre-right republican with 11% and the radical left Jean-Luc Mélénchon, who travels at 9%. A signal that should not be underestimated, given that according to estimates the ferocious protest of recent weeks will also cause damage to the French economy in the last quarter of the year. This is a -0,1%, nothing compared to -5,3% in the second quarter of 1968, following the protests in May in Paris, but still worrying.
Thus, Macron counterattacked and announced to the nation that from 2019 the minimum wage will increase by 100 euros per month (the famous SMIC), that pensioners who receive a check of less than 2.000 euros a month will not pay contributions and that overtime hours will be tax-exempt, just as the year-end bonus that the president has suggested to companies will be tax-free " who can afford it” to distribute to their employees in the coming weeks. In the next few days there will also be a table with the big companies to see how Paris can - if it can - contribute to this extraordinary effort, which serves to give a strong signal, even if Macron has already said that it will not be accompanied by the return of the solidarity tax on large fortunes, precisely that tax whose abolition cost the young tenant of the Elysée the reputation of "president of the rich". Now Macron, who is at stake at the European elections in May (and on whose fate the future of the moderates in Europe is at stake), is trying again to be the president of the people. Is it still in time?
