France Turns Left ;	France	Turns	Left  
FRANCE TODAY has the highest unemployment rate among leading industrialized nations. The triumph of the leftist opposition in Sunday's election reflects votersÛª understandable ahxiety about this state of affairs. Unfortunately, the winnersÛª program, if carried out, is likely to make the problem worse.</br></br>' Conservative French President Jacques Chirac gambled when he called early elections, hoping for a parliament that would support him during the remaining five years of his term. Instead, his conservative allies lost badly to the Socialist and Communist parties. Now Mr. Chirac will uncomfortably share power with a leftist government led by a Socialist prime minister, Lionel Jospin.</br></br>-As in any election, diverse factors of personality, tactics and policy played their parts. But the chief issue was one that confronts the United States and every other nation as well: how to balance the needs and desires of each countryÛªs population with the harsh rigors of economic globalization.</br></br>In todayÛªs world, technology and capital are increasingly mobile; businesses can set up shop wherever profits will be greatest. Not only can ! hey; businesses that pass up opportunitiesÛÓout of loyalty to their home communities or countries, lor example, or by order of home governmentsÛÓ may soon be passed by. Thus, nations find their own political possibilities limited; if they set taxes high to fund a generous social safety net, businesses will move away, shrinking the tax base and requiring even higher taxes.</br></br>France has one of the highest tax rates around; public spending accounts for more than of half its total economy, compared with about one-third in the United States. Government employs one-quarter of all workers, compared with one in seven in the United States. Nationalization of industry does guarantee that some jobs stay in France, and generous benefitsÛÓearly retirement ages, for exampleÛÓare lovely for those with jobs. But both discourage private job creation; the unemployment rate in France is nearly 13 percent and growing.