Joel Kotkin is an Irvine Senior Fellow at the New America Foundation, the author of The City: A Global History (Modern Library, 2005) and a friend of Houston Strategies’ Tory Gattis. Mr. Kotkin came to my attention recently for his insightful writings on urban planning (here and here) during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
In this OpinionJournal op-ed, Mr. Kotkin addresses the unintended consequences in France of governmental policies such as high taxation, the welfare state and the economic barriers to entry caused by excessive regulation:

The French political response to the continuing riots has focused most on the need for more multicultural “understanding” of, and public spending on, the disenchanted mass in the country’s grim banlieues (suburbs). What has been largely ignored has been the role of France’s economic system in contributing to the current crisis. State-directed capitalism may seem ideal for such American admirers such as Jeremy Rifkin, author of “The European Dream,” and others on the left. Yet it is precisely this highly structured and increasingly infracted economic system that has so limited opportunities for immigrants and their children. In a country where short workweeks and early retirement are sacred, there is little emphasis on creating new jobs and even less on grass-roots entrepreneurial activity.

Read the entire piece.