French Economic Austerity and er… the impact on Cycling

I was furiously blogging away today – ‘Warming up on a turbo’  in the morning. The French austerity budget for my economics blog in the afternoon. What a life.

paris

Everything was going very well. Except my astute cycling readers may have wondered what the French national debt has to do with improving your cycling fitness. It’s all very interesting but, even the new French budget is unlikely to alter the fact that a Frenchman last won the Tour de France back when the French National debt was still a number that didn’t involve an impossibly long number of zeros.

 

recession

John D. Q1. The graph of the French national debt represents the gradient of which hill? – Mow Cop. Starts of steady, with a 25% finish towards the line.

But, now for something completely different and some cycling news.

Could European Austerity help the Boom in Cycle Sales?

Italian bike sales outstrip car sales as austerity bites

  • During 2011 -  1,750,000 bicycles were sold in Italy, a 10 per cent increase on the previous year,
  • 1,748,143  new cars were registered, down 20 per cent year on year and the lowest level since 1964
  • This is the first time that bike sales have outstripped car sales in Italy since WWII.
  • Perhaps the same could happen in France.
  • Now all those French Millionaires (taxed to 75%) the poor chaps may soon be resorting to the humble old push bike. So even austerity policies could have a silver lining.

So there you go, even economics can have an impact on  cycling.

Just in case, you want a run down on the impact of deflationary fiscal and monetary policy in an economic union, the original post has been moved to a more fitting setting.

(If it’s any consolation, I’m sure I’ve sent my economics readers a post on the optimal power vs weight ratio for climbing Alpe d’Huez.)



3 Responses to French Economic Austerity and er… the impact on Cycling

  1. John D October 2, 2012 at 4:05 pm #

    Q1. The graph of the French national debt represents the gradient of which hill?

  2. Patanga October 2, 2012 at 3:26 pm #

    Tejvan, I think this fits very nicely on the cycle blog. Also is further proof that anything can be reduced to a Monty Python sketch.

  3. Ben Griffiths October 2, 2012 at 1:29 pm #

    What an exciting blog post for cyclists ;-)

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