o Europeans, a generous amount of vacation and holiday time ranks up there with the droits de l'homme. Nodding to this sacrosanct ideology, the European Union Directive grants Europeans a minimum four-week stretch of paid leave. And many European countries exceed that minimum in their national legislation and collective agreements.

France, for example, enjoys a statutory minimum of 25 paid vacation days. Add in holidays, and the total can push the number above six weeks. In the U.S., there is no statutory minimum for vacation days or holidays. Paid time off is a matter of agreement between an employer and an employee, and on average is significantly lower than in Europe.

On the flipside, the French pay for their plentiful time off in lower annual income. "The French have 30% less income than the Americans, but correspondingly more time free for spending with their families or on holiday travel," said Paul Swaim, an economist at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. He adds that American workers may be paying a significant price in diminished life quality due to the number of long hours logged in certain occupations and the "24/7 economy."

http://www.careerjournal.com/myc/workabroad/20041123-sterling.html

The first, is definitional: What is Wealth? Is it merely income or the accumulation of goods?

Wealth consists of more than that: Leisure time is a luxury, and as such is part of a person's wealth. The quality of your education and health care also are a reflection of your wealth. Depending upon what yardstick you use as a measure, we are either the wealthiest country in the world, or the most overworked, harried, stressed out collection of work droids the planet has ever seen. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle: We willingly trade one form of wealth (time) for another form of wealth (income).

http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2004/07/productivity_or.html

They were never friendly nations until the more recent times. They couldn't have cared less who won, as long as the English were preoccupied, that was the payoff.

From the beginning Americans realized they could not sustain a long conflict without outside help. The ability of the colonials to make arms and weaponry would be severely hampered if and when the British occupied Eastern cities. For that reason, the Americans turned to foreign countries for help.

They were rebuffed in Germany and Holland. But, they found a receptive if reluctant ally in the French. The French were still smarting from the long and costly war with the British known as the Seven Years War. Also, the French had ample holdings in the new world and they saw the British as a potential threat to those.

Volunteers from France arrived first, among them the Marquis de Lafayette. Although not yet 20 years old, he was given the rank of major general and assigned to Washington's staff. He and Washington developed a friendship that was to last until Washington's death.

The original American diplomat sent to deal with the French was Silas Deane. He had some success. For example, the French provided supplies valued at about $200,000 a year for the first two years of the war, 1775 and 1776. But the French remained unconvinced that it would be in their best interest to support the Americans with a treaty and to send troops.

One of the reasons the French had been reluctant to get involved in the conflict was their concern that the Americans did not have the willpower or the firepower to fight on equal terms with the British. However, the Americans' decisive victory at the battle of Saratoga on October 14, 1777, changed their minds.

In 1776 the American congress had authorized a treaty of commerce and amity with the French. The treaty to which the French agreed in 1778 - after much encouragement by Franklin - added military provisions. The treaty was signed on February 6, 1778, and made public on March 20. Ultimately the French were to play the major role in the surrender of the British Army at Yorktown in 1781.

The French had had troops in America earlier. They were involved in the unsuccessful siege of Savannah in September 1779. But it was at Yorktown that the contribution of the French became most significant.

Here's how that happened: The French had a fleet of 28 ships standing by in the Caribbean. In the late summer of 1781 the fleet sailed into the Chesapeake Bay. This move effectively foiled the British plan to have their ships come from New York to resupply their troops at Yorktown. The French ships blocked the British, making the resupply impossible.

Meanwhile French troops began arriving from the north. Some of them were stationed across the Chesapeake Bay to thwart the planned British escape route. Other French troops joined the Americans in their siege of the British, now effectively hemmed in at Yorktown. In all, more than 8,000 French troops were involved - the same number as the American force. With no place to go, the British capitulated.

Several interesting footnotes remain.

Without the involvement of the French, the U.S. victory (especially at the time and in the way that it happened) would have been in doubt. But, the Americans almost from the first failed to give adequate recognition to the French for what they had done. In fact, by 1798 the United States was fearful of a possible invasion by the French. This became one of the justifications for the passage of the Alien and Sedition Acts.

The involvement in the American cause turned out to be quite costly for the French government. It was never clearly established that the supplies were loans and not gifts - an issue never settled. As a result, the involvement in America and the unpaid monies turned out to be one of the factors that soon plunged the government into the chaos that resulted in the French Revolution.

http://www.class.uh.edu/comm/classes/comm4303/section2/
revolutionarywar.html#involvementfrench

well mr American I think ur personaly stupid an to be honest the French are cowards we should send them all to Iraq at least they would teach them to surrender

British and proud

There is a French mentality about families, and their importance, which an American is going to see as...laziness. It isn't actually, and the same things been mentioned about Quebecers too.

14,802 people, mostly elderly, died in France from heat, according to the country's largest funeral service.[2] France does not commonly have very hot summers (seven days with temperatures of more than 40°C (104 F) were recorded in Auxerre,Yonne between July and August 2003), particularly in the northern areas. As a consequence, most people do not know how to react to very high temperatures (for instance, with respect to rehydration), and most homes and retirement homes are not equipped with air conditioning. Furthermore, while there are contingency plans for a variety of catastrophes and natural events, high heat had never been considered a major hazard and so such plans for heat waves did not exist at the time.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_European_heat_wave

To the French, and their descendants Quebecers, being rich is being with your family

racist
One entry found.

racism




Main Entry: rac·ism
Pronunciation: \ˈrā-ˌsi-zəm also -ˌshi-\
Function: noun
Date: 1933
1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
2 : racial prejudice or discrimination

"I just love the French. They taste like chicken!" ---- Hannibal Lecter

"France has neither winter nor summer nor morals. Apart from these drawbacks it is a fine country. France has usually been governed by prostitutes." ---Mark Twain

"I would rather have a German division in front of me than a French one behind me." --- General George S. Patton

"The French are a smallish, monkey-looking bunch and not dressed any better, on average, than the citizens of Baltimore. True, you can sit outside in Paris and drink little cups of coffee, but why this is more stylish than sitting inside and drinking large glasses of whiskey I don't know." --- P.J O'Rourke (1989)