“The problem with socialism,” Margaret Thatcher famously observed, “is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.” Thatcher derailed Britain’s creeping post-WWII socialism and reoriented the UK back to market-based economics. Her most recent successors have undone much of that legacy, and the British government’s need to crack down on speech is one aspect of their revanchism, although more of it can be explained by anger over immigration policies and results over the past two decades.
However, at least the UK has one small comfort. They haven’t fallen so far down the “democratic socialist” rabbit hole as France. Economist and data analyst Michael Arouet published what he calls “probably the scariest chart you’ll see today,” outlining a dire economic Sword of Damocles for the French government and people. Arouet explains what the chart says, and what it means (via Instapundit):
This is probably the scariest chart you’ll see today. Let me translate it for you: only one-third of French people have a private-sector job.
How are they supposed to feed the remaining two-thirds with their taxes? It’s starting to feel like a failed state. pic.twitter.com/HLIHfG1PHo
— Michael A. Arouet (@MichaelAArouet) December 2, 2025
Starting? It already feels like a failed state, but … how different are les Françaises from us?
Let’s lay out each charted category in the data from France in English, starting at the top and working clockwise:
- Private sector employees: 30%
- Independent workers: 3%
- Others (apparently as opposed to retirees, not working): 8%
- Retirees: 24%
- Government workers: 8%
- Students (adult): 4%
- Minors: 20%
- Unemployed: 3%
One key point to note here is the inclusion of non-working-age minors. That makes sense for this kind of analysis, but it does make it a little more difficult to perform an apples-to-oranges comparison to the US. However, we can clean a few points from the latest data compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau. According to the latter, the current US population is just under 343 million.
According to BLS Household data, the workforce-eligible population amounts to 274.2 million, almost precisely 80% of the overall population, roughly similar to France. Of that population, 171.2 million actually participate in the workforce, with the other 102 million classified as “not in labor force,” presumably retired, on disability, or otherwise ineligible. That is 37.6%, somewhat similar to France when adding up retirees, ‘others,’ and adult students (36%).
In the US, 136 million work in the private sector, according to BLS Establishment data. That is just shy of 40% of the overall population in the US, using the same calculation as in Arouet’s charts. Another 23.6 million work in government jobs at various levels in the US. That is 6.9% of the US population. Rounding up generously, only 47% of the American population works on a consistent basis, compared to 41% for France. A statistically significantly higher percentage of workers are employed in the private sector here than in France, but it’s only an eight-point difference rather than a drastically different population profile.
This is not to argue that France isn’t facing a crisis. While the population statistics are not all that far off from the US, and the private sector is weaker, the real difference is the costs of the socialist states that France and the EU are erecting. They are more comprehensive and costly than in the US, which in turn incentivizes exits from the workforce. That adds up to a real crisis that is growing more acute, in a political environment where socialism keeps expanding.
However, we’d be foolish to ignore the same trends and the same potential disaster ahead here in the US. Marxism has become ascendant in the Democrat Party, with plans to nationalize industries like health care and potentially energy production outright, while accomplishing the same through regulation on other “private” industries. We are facing the same crisis, even if it isn’t as acute here as it might be in France.
Or to put it another way: France may run out of other people’s money first, but that doesn’t mean we won’t last a whole lot longer on the same arc. The people of France should be scared – but we should be at least worried. And we should see political leadership in this country recognize the danger and do something to reverse the trend.
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