WHEN Claude Monet lived near the Seine at Argenteuil, he painted white canvas sails and river banks. Today, Argenteuil is part of the suburban sprawl west of Paris, and is more famous for being the most indebted large town in France. A recent report from the Cour des Comptes, the national audit body, told the town hall to take urgent measures to curb the deficit “in line with the gravity of the situation”.Across the country, town halls are facing a budget squeeze. As part of its effort to control the national deficit, which this year is yet again set to bust the euro zone’s 3% rule, President François Hollande’s Socialist government has promised €50 billion ($ 64 billion) of budget savings from 2015 to 2017. Of this, it says €11 billion will come from reduced transfers to local government. But persuading town halls to apply such cuts may prove the most difficult piece of the French deficit puzzle.Argenteuil is poorer than the average French town, and its unemployment rate is nearly 17%. The share of residents living in subsidised public housing, in the concrete towers that ring the town, is twice the national average. And like many French towns,…
