French workers: “Negotiate this”

A handful of workers in France were likely thinking that this week when they threatened to blow up gas canisters at their factories to protest unsatisfactory compensation: Staff at JLG Industries in Tonneins, south-western France, made the threat in order to get better redundancy terms for 53 workers. JLG capitulated today, promising to award those ...

A handful of workers in France were likely thinking that this week when they threatened to blow up gas canisters at their factories to protest unsatisfactory compensation:

A handful of workers in France were likely thinking that this week when they threatened to blow up gas canisters at their factories to protest unsatisfactory compensation:

Staff at JLG Industries in Tonneins, south-western France, made the threat in order to get better redundancy terms for 53 workers.

JLG capitulated today, promising to award those 53 employees as much as $42,000 each. The incident is but the latest in a rash of anti-employer stalemates and boss-nappings in the country.

Labor settlements are often negotiated at gunpoint, of course. But in this case, it’s the workers who have their finger on the trigger.

WARNER BROS.

Brian Fung is an editorial researcher at FP.

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