There is a remarkable consensus that the way to get the economy moving is to increase employment. Workers with jobs will spend their wages and this extra consumption will cause employers to hire even more workers to provide the goods and services the workers who already have jobs want or need. One way to increase employment which has yet to be suggested is the industrial injury. The employer has to keep on paying the injured worker's salary (at any rate in la douce France) and so the injured worker can carry on in his benevolent and productive consumption. And the employer also has to hire a replacement and thus are created two jobs where there was only one. Even better, the replacement worker has as precarious a job as any business leader could wish.

There is, of course, one problem. The plan relies on the injured worker's job being necessary, and the employer replacing him. This will not be the case if one is, for instance, an EU commissioner or a captain of industry. But for the rest of us our economic duty is clear- we should get hurt at work.

As the picture above shows I am, as ever, leading by example.