Business failures:
numerous and
increasing
It has become a commonplace
remark, but the issue is sufficiently
serious to recall: the number of
business failures in France has
increased continuously over the
last ten years. After having dipped
into a trough of 38,000 annual
failures in 2001 and 2002, the
annual number of bankruptcy
proceedings now processed by the
commercial courts has climbed to
roughly 60,000.While the figure
has diminished slightly since the
disaster of 2009 when nearly
62,000 bankruptcy proceedings
were held, the pre-crisis levels
(approximately 50,000
insolvencies in 2007) are nowhere
in sight. As frighteningly
impressive as they are, these
figures only really take on
meaning within the context of a
body of companies. Studying
them in this way, we can truly
judge the effects their
disappearance has on the national
economic fabric.
