From Alain Peyrefitte's "Le mal français", published in 1976, which denounced a fussy bureaucracy, an excess of centralization, a weakness of the entrepreneurial spirit and an overly dirigiste state, a work that was a great success, to the latest book by the former governor of the Bank of France, Jacques de Larosière, who wonders if "the French decline is reversible",  there are countless publications that give a negative image of France and its economy. Self-denigration has become a national sport as the systematic criticism of everything that should be considered successes.

Nuclear power provides a first example, while in terms of safety and competitiveness, our power plants were an indisputable success in enabling the country to have one of the cheapest electricity in Europe. They have also made a decisive contribution to the reduction of France's greenhouse gas emissions. But the unjustified blocking of the programme from 1997 onwards led to the loss of essential skills, which was the cause of the slippage in costs and deadlines at Flamanville. The closure of Fessenheim without technical reason and under German pressure is part of this negative logic, as is the announcement that France was not only not going to build new reactors, but that it was going to close a significant part of the fleet.

Fortunately, 2022 saw a complete turnaround and an ambitious programme was announced. But critics rebounded, considering that the cost was excessive and even claiming that France's export position with a surplus of more than 5 billion euros in 2024, made these investments useless since we were in "overcapacity". When we look at the major energy crisis that Germany is facing because the country has made bad choices, we can only be surprised by the relentlessness of some of our "elites" to constantly criticize our successes.

A second example is provided by the TGV. The programme had been blocked by the Barre government in 1979, which had prevented the completion of the Paris-Lyon line. The Mauroy government and its successors relaunched the programme, which gave France a railway network that is the envy of all of Europe. But this did not prevent professional critics from launching criticism campaigns, explaining that this had been done to the detriment of secondary lines, that the network was poorly maintained and that it had contributed to the desertification of unserved territories.

We could add tourism, as France has consolidated its position as the world's leading destination in 2024 with more than 100 million visitors. A concept has even been invented to denigrate this activity: "overtourism". Our researchers would have "dropped out" and gone abroad. Need we remind you that France is one of the countries to have won the largest number of Fields Medals and Nobel Prizes? And when a large international company recruits a Frenchman to run it, people are indignant, calling him a tax exile, instead of welcoming it, since it demonstrates the country's ability to train very high-level managers.

This negative climate has found new ground with the accumulation of deficits and the increase in public debt resulting from the mistakes of past governments. The management of the State with a growing and costly bureaucracy that works to produce texts and standards that complicate the lives of the French and handicap companies, deserves severe criticism and a profound change in the methods of government. Instead, they are trying to scare people to impose unpopular measures that will hit those who are not responsible for the situation and by using distorted international comparisons to demonstrate that France is in trouble.

For a long time, Germany served as an example. It was the good student with its external surpluses and budgetary rigour. Everything has changed with Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which has disrupted the energy model, and with the trade war initiated by Donald Trump, which will heavily affect the great strength of German industry, the automotive sector. As for public finances, the control of deficits was the result of the low level of military and infrastructure spending. It is now part of ancient history after the new Chancellor's announcements correcting past shortcomings and the support that the Social Democratic Party will give him.

We also never cease to denounce France's "stalling" in the face of the United States. In any case, it does not come from the respective situations of public finances. The US budget deficit in 2024 reached 6.2% of GDP and the federal debt 124%. In France, the state debt at the end of 2024 reached 92% of GDP. The 113% figure includes local governments and social welfare systems and is therefore not comparable to the US figure.

The United States, since the election of Donald Trump, is even starting to have financial difficulties. The dollar, a sign of defiance, has devalued by nearly 10% and tensions are emerging on the markets. The interest rate on the 10-year federal bond has reached 4.25% while in France it is only 3.25%.

These alarmist analyses are careful not to cite an essential fact: the increase in household wealth. In addition to a high rate of property ownership, since nearly one in two households owns its own home, there has been an unprecedented accumulation of financial savings, which now stands at 6000 billion euros, once consumer credit is deducted. The discourse claiming that we would pass on the public debt to our children therefore makes no sense since they will inherit much larger sums than would be necessary to repay it.

The other weakness invoked, deindustrialization, is based on erroneous criteria. The decline in the workforce is mainly due to automation. Agriculture has experienced the same trend with the fall in the workforce to less than 5% of the working population. This did not prevent it from remaining the first in Europe. As for the share of manufacturing industry in GDP, its decline is largely the result of strong growth in other sectors such as finance and tourism. In addition, many industrial companies outsource certain activities requiring the use of high technologies, which are therefore not included in the statistics. This has enabled the development of companies such as Dassault-Systèmes and Cap Gemini. Again, should we be worried?

The disappearance of several major industrial groups or their transfer to foreign control was the result of the strategic errors of their managers (Alcatel, Lafarge, the steel industry) and not of excessive taxation or labour costs, since other sectors (aeronautics, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics or high-end consumer goods) have experienced major successes. This systematically negative vision has serious consequences: it distorts the appreciation of the problems, which, as everywhere, are real, and it leads to bad decisions, sometimes leading to the opposite effect of what is intended, or arousing indignation and generating social movements which will lead to their abandonment.

The excessive use of biased statistical comparisons does not therefore contribute, in a context marked by permanent malaise, to finding appropriate measures to remedy the weaknesses of the French economy, which are very real but certainly not a harbinger of a decline and even less of bankruptcy.