Date:         Wed, 26 Aug 92 13:14:57 PDT
From:         Eric Fenster <efenster@IGC.APC.ORG>
Subject:      Eurodisney troubles
Comments: To: n%i@apc.org, travel-l@rec
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.travel-l

Eurodisney near Paris is having a bad first year with attendance well
below expectations.
The stock offering which began at 72 and was at 165 before the opening
in April is down to 68 and lost 11% in just 3 days last week.
Staff resignations have been 10% in just 4 months, and complaints
have been carried in the press and on TV.
----------
From an article in this week's French newspaper, Le Canard Enchaine,
headlined: Mickey invents exploitation of man by mouse.

 To stack four workers in tiny 3-room apartments lost among the beet fields
and take in exchange $1700, as much as the rent of a good Paris apartment,
will go down as one of Uncle Scrooge's great financial successes.
 The site of this exploit is Magny-le-Hongre, a village of 350 inhabitants
so isolated there's not even a store to speak of. In 1991, Mickey chose
this idyllic hole to install a building complex pompously called, The
Woodworking Residence, consisting of 200 3-room aparments for 4 people
each.
 With well-trimmed lawns and Louisiana-style wood facades, this Disney site
could give one false illusions. Everything seems all spruced up, but the
other side of the decor is less glossy. With two miniscule bedrooms
containing 2 beds each, Disney has managed to stuff 4 people into each of
these apartments of less than 650 sq ft.  And there's no question of "cast
members" choosing their roommates. Those who are going to share the same
room are selected by the personnel service. And always of the same sex.
Uncle Scrooge has no intention of forking out maternity benefits.

continued next message
 Two bathrooms and a living room with a pullman kitchen round out this
palace. But there's not much furniture to take up space, and an extra
mattress allows Mickey to lodge a fifth person in case of need. As for a
telephone, it's in the hallway.
 It's not enought that the occupants are squeezed in like sardines, they
have to submit to being under constant surveillance. "Investigators," who
have keys to every apartment can visit without warning and search the
closets.
 There's no question of having a boyfriend or girlfriend over to pass a
pleasant night. Doing so gets you evicted. And anyway, one of the house
rules forbids moving two beds next to each other.
 In case of layoff, Mickeys kids are invited to pack their bags within 24
hrs. Andrew, a young Englishman, had the experience recently. He'd hardly
been given his walking papers when a squadron of goons moved out his things
and changed the locks. And yet, the brochure Disney hands out to job
seekers promises that cast members who are let go will be given 30 days to
find a new roof.
 To live in this corner of heaven, each of the 800 tenants must give Disney
$425, almost half his salary.
 In his defense, Disney claims this sum includes the rent itself ($270) and
$155 in other charges. Anyway, $1100 in rent for 4 people and $600 in
monthly charges--and no itemized bill. Yet Scrooge gets a quantity discount
for electricity. [Electricity is included in the charges, but tenants can't
tell whether the quantity saving is passed on to them or whether Disney is
charging them regular rates and pocketing the difference.]...

In association with the National Bank of Paris, Disney is currently
completing another housing project for 1,300 people. At a rent of $300 to
$440 per bed, the affair looks like it's going to be "profitable," as one
of Scrooge's representatives admitted.  Magic, no?

From the French newspaper, Le Canard Enchaine, with the headline, The grab-
all regime of Uncle Scrooge

 If you believe the "cast members" who no longer seem amused by the little
mouse, the Mickey spirit" the administration brags so much about is
reserved only for visitors to the park. Example: during one of the rare
strikes, security agents photographed the participants and the leaders were
fired. Easy, given the policy of short-term work contracts. [Retribution
against strikers is illegal in France. Most strikes last hours or a day.]
 Other Disney employess don't run such risks... in a word: stoolpigeons,
gallant workers who wear the same costumes that they spy on. They mix with
them and note down their errors, deficiencies and mistakes in behavior
twoard the dera public. Thpse who get bad maks are at once sent off to do
tasks less noble but more in line with their temperament, like night
maintenance of the park and its surroundings.
 Another house method: It is not because of racism that Mickey assigns
blacks and others of color to the drudgery of cleaning toilets and similar
work, but because they don't correspond, it seems, to American standards
for jobs which involve contact with the public.  As a result of these
selection criteria, an Antillaise woman with a master's degree in economics
is taking care of the toilets.

continued next msg
 ...[the average gross monthly salary is $1200] The majority of employees
work in costume, but paid time begins only when one arrives at the place of
wirk itself. The time it takes to get from the park entrance to the costume
building, to dress and to get to one's work site counts for 15 minutes,
even though most employees require 40.
 Eurodisney gives with one hand and takes with the other. Mickey houses
employees, but since the park is far from everything and the "cast members"
have onle 30 minutes for lunch [the law forbids anybody to take less], they
eat at Mickey's, they quench their thirst at Mickey's and relax at Mickey's
after work.
 The collective bargaining agreement was signed by only one union, The
Confederation of Free Unions, with a reputation for never having given a
boss any anxiety. The result is an upsurge in recruitment by the CGT [left
wing union[.
 Mickey, the Yankee mouse, is giving new life to the class struggle in
France and resurrecting Marxist unionism.  And that, indeed, is the stuff
of fairly tales.
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