90 percent of SNCF's state-run rail and regional departures have been canceled, as well as 30 percent of Air France's domestic departures. Up to twenty percent of the country's schools are closed on Thursday, and eleven of the sixteen metro lines in Paris are closed.

Large parts of France are still standing during the mass strike. Trade unions have warned that it is likely to be long-lasting and may last until Christmas.

The reason? President Emmanuel Macron's highly controversial pension reform.

Universal system

The cost of France's general pension system corresponds to 14 percent of the country's GDP, according to the Reuters news agency. That makes the system one of the most expensive in the world.

Basically reforming it was one of Emmanuel Macron's main promises for the 2017 presidential election and in October, plans to launch the laborious work were launched.

The reform means, among other things, that different pension tables - today 42 in number, with different levels of benefits depending on whether the employment has been in the public or private sector - are merged into a single, universal template.

The striking unions, which argue that the proposal risks disadvantaging several groups, have promised to hold off until all plans for reform are abandoned.

- Macron is the president of the employers. This reform is a disguised gift to them, says Benjamin Amar, spokesman for France's second largest trade union Confederation (CGT) to The Local.

pension War

The strike could last for weeks and its scope become historic, estimates Forbes magazine - perhaps in par with the one who crippled France in 1995.

Even then, pension reforms were haunting, proposed by then-Prime Minister Alain Juppé.

Juppé held the banner high for weeks, despite the fact that the two largest unions broke tradition by coordinating themselves for maximum effect. For almost a month, France was almost silent. Only five percent of public transport was in use and on December 12, over two million people participated in a nationwide protest march, according to Le Parisien.

Alain Juppé and President Jaques Chirac eventually withdrew from the proposal.

The attempts to reform the pension system as a whole were put on ice, and the humiliating defeat seemed to serve as a lesson for their successors who dealt with the issue with cotton gloves.

Macron is stuck

But President Emmanuel Macron, whose nearly three years in power was gradually edged by angry protesters wearing yellow vests across the country, does not falter.

During a press conference in his hometown of Amiens on November 22, President Macron called French society "too negative," and criticized unspecific Frenchmen who take "every opportunity to bring disorder" into society, according to French television channel C News.

The government has repeatedly promised to launch the reform, strike or not.