Strikes across France disrupt schools, transport

Hundreds of thousands of people across France marched Thursday against raising the retirement age from 62 to 64. But French President Emmanuel Macron said he will continue with the plan. In France, everyone receives a state pension, and Macron said that amid rising life expectancies and higher costs of living, raising the retirement age is the only way to keep the pension program financially solvent. By noon Thursday, Paris police said they had detained about 30 protesters. 

What’s the protesters’ message? Unions argued that the pension overhaul threatens hard-fought rights and instead proposed taxing the wealthy or adding to payroll contributions. There were more than 200 rallies Thursday across France, including people who work in the education, air travel, and rail travel industries. Electricity workers said they reduced power supplies that day in protest. The official retirement age of many countries, including the United States, is 67. 

Dig deeper: Listen to Myrna Brown’s report on The World and Everything in It podcast about the future of Social Security in America.