How the world’s richest man became a lightning rod in French retirement age row

Macron’s pension reform plan is facing fierce resistance, with calls to tax tycoons instead.

Protesters in France have been exhorting the world’s richest man, LVMH owner Bernard Arnault, to do more for the common good. PHOTO: AFP
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President Emmanuel Macron’s unpopular plan to raise the retirement age by two years to 64 has ignited a debate in egalitarian-minded France: are the billionaires to blame?

As labour unions held a second massive strike on Tuesday, which drew hundreds of thousands of people onto the streets across the country, left-wing politicians have gone on the attack to argue that taxing the super-rich would be a better way to plug deficits in the state-run pension system.

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