On the subject of how the appalling French welfare state unfairly takes money from one category to hand it out to another (the old Thatcherite refrain), I forgot to mention this one:

all self-employed people in France pay contributions to the national health insurance scheme; the base is their expenses-deducted before-tax income, and the rate is 0.5% up to the Social Security "ceiling" (€31K approx for 2006), and 5.19% beyond that.

But doctors only pay 0.11%, with no increase above the "ceiling". In other words, they get a huge cut in their national health contributions, and other people have to fork out the difference.

fredouil seems to believe these poor individuals are oppressed by "privileged" rail workers etc.

LOL.