London's French Foreign Legion Shuns Sarkozy Plea to Come Home

Like many French citizens, Rousseau says he left home to start his own business without being weighed down by high taxes and restrictive labor laws. Now he sells about 2,200 croissants each weekend, and he has just ordered 100,000 pounds ($197,650) of equipment to meet demand for his baguettes and quiches.

Rousseau, 35, is just one example of the Gallic invasion of London, now home to some 190,000 French expatriates. So many well-educated young people have moved to the U.K. that President Nicolas Sarkozy has urged ``France's children'' to bring their talents home.

(...)

``In France, you work for others,'' Rousseau says. ``You're dead before you get started.''

(...)

One of the biggest attractions is an economy whose growth has outpaced that of France this decade, creating jobs that don't exist at home. Unemployment in France is 7.9 percent compared with 5.2 percent in the U.K., according to figures from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Beyond prosperity, London's informality attracts many French people suffocated by the social mores of Paris. ``No one asks for your age or your diploma here,'' Sivilia says.

That new sense of freedom balances out living in the congested and expensive U.K. capital.

``The public services are a catastrophe, Heathrow is a third-world airport, but no one worries about it,'' says Marc Levy, a French novelist living in London's Chelsea neighborhood. ``The Brits are phlegmatic and that helps your creativity.''

Jobs created over the past ten years in the UK: 2.5M
Jobs created over the past 10 years in France: 2.5M (almost all of them under Jospin)


In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes