While the issue of work has come back to the fore with the pension reform, a study by the Institut Montaigne, published this Thursday, February 2 and produced by the economist Bertrand Martinot, intends to “go beyond received ideas” about the French at work. We learn, for example, that 77% of working people say they are satisfied or rather satisfied at work and that 80% of workers say they are satisfied with the meaning of their work.
However, in 2021, more than 1.6 million French people, or 5.5% of the working population, have resigned from their jobs. An unprecedented figure in France (2021 was one of the only two years in twenty years to exceed the bar of 500,000 resignations). Called “the great resignation”, this phenomenon first observed in the United States would be linked to the awareness of employees, accelerated with the confinements, of not finding their way in their work. If some take the plunge for financial reasons or related to the arduousness of their job, others feel a cruel lack of meaning in their work.
39.8 hours of work on average
The Institut Montaigne survey, carried out with the help of the consulting firm Kearney, is based on an online survey conducted by Kantar Public from September 15, 2022 to October 03, 2022 with a representative sample of 5,001 French workers. employed. Thus, the three main factors of dissatisfaction before the health crisis still stand out today: the level of remuneration for 46% of employees, the lack of recognition in 38% of cases and the absence of career prospects (for 41% of respondents).
Full-time workers report working an average of 39.8 hours per week, and 45.8 hours for the self-employed. Nearly a quarter of working people, however, believe that their workload is excessive. The author of the study, however, observes “no correlation link” between the duration of work and the feeling that the workload is excessive. Most of the factors that explain such a feeling “are subjective”, according to the study, which highlights the relationship difficulty with management, the psychological load or the low degree of autonomy.
A new source of dissatisfaction, potentially divisive between the different categories of workers, has appeared: the impossibility of teleworking. However, the development of telework (40% of working people practice it at least occasionally at the end of 2022, compared to only 7.4% in 2017, according to INSEE) has largely influenced the usual framework of 35 hours which has broken out according to the study which emphasizes “an increasing spread of working hours”, the practice of usual office hours becoming a minority (40% of respondents). “Traditional working hours are disappearing, in favor of more atypical hours: at least 35% of respondents say they often or always work on weekends, in the evening after 8 p.m. and/or on public holidays”, underlines the institute. Also, half of employees (49%) are dissatisfied with telework, because they cannot practice it or not as much as they would like. For the 60% who do not have access to it, it is a “reason for strong frustration”, notes the Institut Montaigne.
The minimum retirement age is still debated
Only 7% of respondents consider the minimum legal retirement age of 62 “not high enough”, while 45% of respondents consider it “appropriate”. Unsurprisingly, the typical profile of working people expressing this opinion is a person with a CSP+ profession (craftsmen, liberal professions, executives), generally over 50 years old, experiencing a high degree of job satisfaction.
However, 47% of respondents consider the minimum legal retirement age of 62 years “excessive”. In question: the physical hardship felt, the lack of career prospects, or the difficulty of reconciling professional life and family life. In this context, notes the author, “it is not surprising that a large minority of employees (44%) would like to retire early, even if it means leaving with a reduced pension”. This result suggests that a “further lengthening of the contribution period for obtaining a full pension without raising the legal minimum age could lead to many early departures with a reduced pension, which would greatly reduce the financial return of ‘such a reform,’ the study reads.
In addition, 20% of employees would be prepared to work less or on different functions, even if it means seeing their remuneration reduced, whether by occupying the same position but part-time via a change of assignment in the same company or via a combination of employment and retirement. “This relative pragmatism opens the way to possibilities of end-of-career accommodation at the level of the company and professional branches”, underlines the report.