Degas...."wren, can the term "free enterprise" be translated into French? Sounds a bit too foreign to me. "

You have it mixed up. The original term is French..Laissez-faire. Free Enterprise is the English translation.

"I think what most USA citizens object to has little to do with convenience. It would be the fact that were being TOLD we can't do something...."

Oh, please! Have you met any TSA folks lately or do you walk between major cities?

When I was but a callow youth, back in the '50s, I clerked in a pharmacy in Baltimore, MD.

At that time, drugstores were allowed to open on Sunday. However, we were not allowed to operate the soda fountain or sell alcoholic beverages.

There was also a list of items that we were not permitted to sell.

Today, in Madison, GA, except for a prohibition on alcohol all shops are allowed to operate on Sunday, although except for the WalMart, Loews and Ingles, everyone closes.

We also have half day opening on Wed and Sat, by local custom.

((I))

As pointed out earlier, the UK has only had Sunday opening for a relatively short while. Having lived with it for ten years or so, I am not convinced that it is a "Good thing". Certainly all the pre law change talk of protecting workers rights and pay on Sunday (It was originally going to be volunteer only at overtime rates) went out of the window very quickly.

Yes it is convenient to be able to pop down to Tescos on a Sunday, but maybe having a day when most of the family would be guaranteed time off was a good thing (I work in a hospital so have never worked a conventional week).

For visitors: If you are a "guest" in another country, it is your responsibility to follow their customs and their laws!! If you can't do that, then you really shouldn't travel. It is no different than being a guest in someone's home. You do things their way!

It makes sense for nurses, firemen, policemen to work around the clock. But people selling T-shirts?

Please hold that line, France. 40 years ago in the US, it was possible to lead a perfectly fruitful and interesting life without being able to shop for doodads at 0400 or all day Sunday. Keep your markets and drugstores open, sure. Maybe some tourist trinket shops if that will help with unemployment.

In US we have quaint local holdovers from Blue Law era. I stood in line at the grocery at 0855 on a Sunday morning behind an irate gentleman not yet allowed to buy bottle of whiskey. At 0900, yes. The clerk relented at 3 minutes till and sold him his whiskey, and one hopes the delay did him some moral good.

PS Shame on Oprah for expecting special treatment at Hermes. I'm sorry they apologized.

You can't buy alcohol in North Carolina before twelve on Sundays. When I attended college in Salisbury, MD, grocery stores were closed on Sundays, something not altered until 1982. In the old days, the Baltimore Colts could not begin a home game before 2 PM on Sunday. I actually approve what we Americans used to call "blue laws." Maybe we shouldn't be consumers 24-7.

altamiro, please! You can't be serious. Common sense, you knew better than that. Stealing is both immoral AND illegal. There may be nothing immoral about doing business 24/7 if it is not your Sabbath or you have no particular religious beliefs. The government shouldn't restrict it. Which religion's Sabbath does the government decide to observe and legislate all businesses closed?

dukey, the USA is not just the TSA (what's that got to do with walking between major cities?). Thanks for confusing a government entity with the entire population and their desire to not be burdened with pointless blue laws.

>altamiro, please! You can't be serious. Common sense, you knew better than that. Stealing is both immoral AND illegal.

Say where? Who decided that stealing is immoral but destroying families by denying them a time together isn't? (I'm overdoing it here, just so you understand the other point of view).

Stealing is immoral. Is speeding immoral? Is drinking alcohol in the open ("open container laws") immoral? Is smoking marihuana immoral, or tobacco? Why does government interfere in all those things?

>There may be nothing immoral about doing business 24/7 if it is not your Sabbath or you have no particular religious beliefs. The government shouldn't restrict it.

Why do you think that the religion should restrict it but the government can't? Why should a church have the precedence over governement? (or the other way around?)

>Which religion's Sabbath does the government decide to observe and legislate all businesses closed?

The locally agreed-upon rules of coexistence of the human society should be enough, don't you think?. That it is sunday and not any other day is just a tradition. Or do you think any law should have a religious base to be respected by you?

Look Mark, I understand that you appreciate the possibility to shop 24/7 where you live. But NOBODY likes to do as they are TOLD - and these cries of "open the french shops 24/7" are exactly that: presuming that you, a guy an ocean away know better what is good for France than the French themselves. How would you react the other way round?

Actually, it is not a basic human right to shop 24/7, even if American woman think it is written in our constitution.

I find it interesting that there is so little concern for finding new ways to reduce the crushing unemployment rate for young people in France. The old way of thinking doesn't seem up to the task of solving that huge problem.

I'm sure many youths would love to have even a part-time job at low pay. Not all of tehm can start out as fat-cat governemnt offcials.

The ARTICLE says "On the mall's behalf, the Ipsos polling agency conducted a survey in April that found 75 percent of people in Paris and the suburbs favored Sunday shop openings, and only 24 percent were opposed. "

How can you turn things around and say that Americans want the French culture to be like theirs? (ckenb--Trying to make France or any other country into another America seems kind of counterproductive. Vive la différence!)

Laissez-faire means no govenment intervention...just the opposite of what this is.

MarkvonKramer represented what I think is a valid point.
"I think what most USA citizens object to has little to do with convenience. It would be the fact that were being TOLD we can't do something. Let the individuals make their own decision to shop or work on any day of the week, Sundays included."

I could care less what they do with their shopping hours in France...it is up to them. The article brings up the possibility that their unemployment could be decreased when stores are allowed to stay open longer...seems like it might be worth trying for the sake of the unemployed.

The French government did try to figure out a way to help with youth unemployment recently, I thought, by making it easier to let young workers go. I seem to remember people taking to the streets over that.

Having read the article, I can't imagine that Louis Vuitton would have taken on a bunch of unemployed lads from the burbs (the social group most likely to be affected by unemployment) to man their Champs-Elysées store on Sundays, had it been allowed to open.

I'm sure many youths would love to have even a part-time job at low pay

That's just the thing in France; employing someone part-time at low pay is very difficult. Once you hire them, you will find it very hard to fire them. I realise that this is different in the USA, it is possible to easily hire people at low wages and fire them when you don't have enough work for them (and after having read 'Nickle and Dimed' about low paying jobs in the USA I'm not sure if that is what we want in Europe).

Also many of the youths are effectively unemployable. Certainly not employable in a service industry. All that would happen is the same as has happened here – the entry level jobs would be taken by well-educated motivated East Europeans, and the long term unemployed would remain just that.

Incidentally France’s brightest and best are coming to London.

>On the mall's behalf, the Ipsos polling agency conducted a survey in April that found 75 percent of people in Paris and the suburbs favored Sunday shop openings, and only 24 percent were opposed. "

If it is so, then there will be enough political will for the change. That's what democratical processes are for. However, the French political structure does not make it possible to make one set of laws for Paris and another one for the countryside. So if enough Frenchmen think the shops should be open all the week, it is a matter of time until they open all week. If the feeling is prevalent only in the particular suburb, tough on the would-be sunday shoppers.

"Actually, it is not a basic human right to shop 24/7, even if American woman (sic) think it is written in our constitution."

Degas, that's rather one-sided. Men do plenty of shopping themselves, you know, and I've never noticed any shortage of male customers on Sunday at stores like Circuit City, Home Depot, REI, etc., and it's NOT because their wives or mothers forced them there.

Tulips, maybe they should let young people sign a waiver to the current "a job for life even if I don't work hard or smart" rule. Oh, wait a minute. That would be going too far in enacting a little supply and demand common sense. I'd rather have them selling goods than plotting more car burnings.

Here's life working at a round-the-clock WalMart or similar place: available for duty any time day or night, rotating shifts and sleep patterns trashed, living on caffeine and then something to help you sleep, no health insurance, social lives fragmented. Well, it's a job. But 24/7/365 is no way to live.