In a country where the constitution explicitly protects a worker's right to strike (think about that for a moment - here in the US a strike is a massively consequential matter), workers are striking about a proposed French law, the "First Job Contract (CPE, contrat premiere embauche)," that will allow employers to fire at will any worker under 26 before their 2 year employment anniversary. The figures for French unemployment are egregious, ranging from the low 10% to the upper 40%'s, when the younger age group is taken in isolation. French employers are hire-shy when looking for employees due to the country's mandated worker benefits - they want to be sure that the investment they make is the absolute right one without being on the hook for paying for underperformers. "Financing those benefits has created a debt whose annual interest approaches France's total annual income-tax revenues." (Time)

This issue is an issue about practical, modern socialism (and the failures thereof) and not, except tangentially, related at all to unions as we here in the US know them. Beware Stateside socialist union doom and gloom naysayers. The French are attempting to reform their robust established social safety net in order to get more people jobs, without resorting to the American-styled capitalism they're even more vehemently against. Add to this the irony that the youth are striking and protesting to salvage a social system that continues to bankrupt France.

So, if I were to be asked to comment, I'd say this to the striking university students and their constitutionally protected union organizers: Grow up.