Well, the arithmetic is truly unpleasant for France with such high debt levels. With debt at 120% of GDP, and nominal GDP growth at 3%, an average borrowing cost of 4-4.5% would need a primary surplus of roughly 1.5% of GDP to keep debt/GDP constant.
Primary deficit is 3%.
France gained 28 million people since 1876, yet six in ten of its communes hold fewer people than they did then. In 1876 half the population lived on 15% of the land. Today it's 3%.
Data: INSEE #France#dataviz
Voici les premières images du CDG Express, le train que reliera la Gare de l'Est et l'aéroport Roissy-Charles de Gaulle 🚄 ✈️
Le prix pour un aller simple s'élèvera à 25 euros pour un adulte et tombera à 16 euros pour les titulaires d'une carte Navigo. Les travaux de raccordement de la nouvelle ligne au réseau national se sont achevés lundi.
https://t.co/tmzA3gObk2
"God created the World, and the Dutch created the Netherlands" - Dutch proverb.
All the beauty and the ingenuity of this European nation, captured in this boat journey from Rotterdam to Amsterdam through the country's canals
🗳️ J'ai créé une carte interactive des résultats de l'élection Présidentielle 2022, tour 1 (pour le moment).
Plus de 34 000 communes, 65 000 bureaux de vote, 539 circonscriptions (métropolitaines pour le moment) !
🔗 https://t.co/4SyC5afVuj
Un fil pour vous la présenter 🧵���
🥁 Après Carto voici... 🚄📊 Stats Tchoo !
https://t.co/LC3qyQBlC8
Tout le #ferroviaire du pays chaque minute dans un dashboard coloré et dynamique grâce aux données statiques et temps-réel de l'#opendata ☺️
👨👩👧👦 La France compte 262 000 habitants supplémentaires chaque année (en moyenne) depuis 2017... mais certaines régions se dépeuplent, tandis que d'autres ont une population de plus importante.
Un fil démographique ⤵️ @le_Parisien
1/8
https://t.co/FU9CAu2nQD
Il sera parfois moqué à la fin de sa vie. Qui pour se souvenir alors du jeune juif polonais, obligé d'arrêter ses études pour vivre? Du communiste, FTP-MOI, arrêté le 23 mars 1943? Du brave qui, torturé devant sa mère, ne dit rien et survit à 2 ans de déportation? Henri Krasucki.
France just beat the world record for nuclear fusion.
In a breakthrough for clean energy pursuits, a nuclear fusion reactor in France has achieved a world-record burn at an astonishing 90 million degrees Fahrenheit (50 million °C) – sustained for over 22 minutes.
On February 12, 2025, the WEST tokamak held a hydrogen plasma steady for 1,337 seconds, shattering the prior mark set mere weeks before by China's EAST.
That's triple the scorching heat of the Sun's core and a full four minutes beyond the previous duration benchmark. Though it didn't produce net energy, this feat highlights our advancing ability to mimic the stellar process that fuels the cosmos.
At its heart, fusion harnesses the power of stars by smashing light atoms like hydrogen into helium, unleashing vast energy in the bargain. In the Sun, this thrives amid crushing gravity and 27 million °F (15 million °C) infernos. Earthbound engineers, lacking such natural compression, rely on devices like WEST to superheat plasma to extreme levels – far beyond solar extremes – while using potent magnetic fields to corral it.
The real hurdle? Preventing the setup from self-destructing under those brutal conditions. WEST's triumph proves we can now stabilize such blistering plasmas for unprecedented stretches, a vital step toward the nearby ITER project, the globe's most ambitious fusion endeavor currently taking shape.
Should ITER and its ilk succeed, fusion promises boundless, eco-friendly power: zero carbon footprint, no meltdown dangers, and minimal long-lived waste.
["French WEST reactor breaks record in nuclear fusion." Advanced Science News, 2025]