Adapting to "new circumstances”

Bloomberg:

«”We badly need France to adapt to new circumstances,” said Ernest-Antoine Seilliere, president of Unice, the European Union employers federation. “The issue is delicate, but we need reform and it has to go through and it will go through. You have to make it very easy for businesses to fire and very easy for businesses to hire.”

The CPE debate has generated questions about job security and the French social model, said William Keylor, a professor of international relations and history at Boston University and author of several books on France.

“It would never occur to an American looking for a job to expect that the employer would not be able to dismiss him or her to save money or for any other economic reason,'' he said. “But in France, the feeling is widespread that employment is a right and that the government must protect that right.”»

Don’t worry it could be worse:

«The protests gathered force after they united students, labor unions and the opposition Socialist Party.
[...]
The opposition Socialists have yet to come up with an alternative plan to cut unemployment, which in some French suburbs stands at more than 40 percent.»

It could be much worse: the Socialists' plan, if they had one.