It does not move during an election period

It does not move during an election period. Dim, Arena, Aubade, Well... same fight It was believed the franco-français debate on relocation dédramatisé, or even digested. It called again at the heart of the campaign. There is not only the disarray of 180 dressmakers of Aubade or 300 employees of Well that strikes the mind. Any operation of subcontracting, often improperly called "relocation", becomes a priori "suspect". Regardless of whether Italian and German SMEs have already widely use for ten years. A common bel élan, proponents of the "just order", Ségolène Royal and Nicolas Sarkozy in mind, tancent "rogue bosses" and show the teeth. Still need to agree on the actual impact of relocations, their true cost and their logic in the long run, avoiding to obscure the face or yield to populist temptations.

"This is not the same thing to dismiss when it is taken by the throat, and that cannot be done otherwise, and move to raise the CAC 40," said Nicolas Sarkozy (1). While describing the phenomenon of relocation of "non-trivial", deciding to "conditionality" of subsidies and aid on employment policy companies. The PS candidate does not so much else brandishing the threat of taxation of businesses which relocate or an obligation of repayment of public aid from unscrupulous employers. Because the manufacturer of swimwear Arena is still slightly beneficial, the regional councillor of Aquitaine, Philippe Buisson (PS), was particularly "immoral" the closure of its site in Libourne (169 jobs), Gironde.

It would be more legitimate than other relocations. No one cannot ban the phenomenon itself, but now prepare us a typology of opprobrium. The size of the undertaking, the State of degradation of its balance sheet, its basin of employment or the nature of its shareholder. At the risk of sketch a unlikely dividing line between the "politically correct" relocations, operated by large groups such as Michelin or AXA, which recently announced the transfer of a portion of its call centres (1,500 positions) in the Morocco of here in 2012 and those, necessarily more "suspicious", SMEs in the textile, a fortiori if they belong to a Swiss group or an Italian investment fund.

Of course, all economists are in agreement: relocations remain a relatively "marginal" macroeconomic phenomenon (5 of jobs destroyed in the EU-15), including on the 2.5 million unemployed or with some 400,000 annual redundancies in France. The merits of each relocation is assessed on a case by case basis. But, except to acknowledge that some are more "media" than others, there is never relocation without pain. "It is always a drama and social plans are extremely costly." "This cannot be a mode effect", says an investor.

Many ways, the relocation of Well is exemplary. Acquired by Natexis Industries (Banque Populaire) Courtaulds Textiles in 2001, after absorption of the English group by Sara Lee, the company is in its third social plan in eight years. Membership increased from 1,200 to 480 employees. Today, it is of the "plan of last resort". For the CEO of Well, Eric Pinot, "the issue is the survival of the company". In other words, the relocation of Well would be the more "justified" because the more urgent, because its operational losses already reach 5 of net sales in 2006, and soon 10 in 2007 (2). In clear, Well is "taken by the throat". A notable difference with Aubade or Arena, which are still slightly beneficiaries and justify the transfer of their production in Tunisia or in China only by the erosion of their sales.

Economist Olivier Pastré, which rises against the transfer of the production of Well in Asia and Tuscany for the backup of a local territory, "the social cost of relocation is very different according to the pool of employment". Le Vigan, in the Cévennes, where the unemployment rate is 17, the relocation of the production of Well become thereby socially unacceptable, even at a "generous" compensation of employees at two years of salary height (against four to eight months for the employees of Aubade). At the same time, the more economically justified relocation would become the less socially acceptable. But, for the shareholder, the poverty of the industrial basin is nothing because of Well. And when a company has lost credibility among its major donors of order, it is doubly legitimated to take a decision which is the only one to save it.

The threat of relocation "wild" or "roughly", "should scare the capitalists", considers Ségolène Royal. It is not said that it reassures employees long-term. Show the finger SMEs délocaliseraient by "financial dogmatism" or thirst for profits is to sing the air of the "electoral protectionism" have recently denounced economists Patrick Artus, Elie Cohen and Jean Pisani-Ferry (3). In the Cévennes, in Poitou-Charentes and Gironde as elsewhere, the real question is not only to limit the case. It will be that local elected representatives and the social partners to give the means to anticipate, in time, industrial change. It is the price to pay to reconcile "the France who suffers" with its companies.