The French are not serious when asked for a survey (1)the vast majority (62%) are in favor of returning the retirement age to 62 years. The head of government is not serious when he promises to restart pension reform “without taboos”, including the retirement age.
We understand the first: the keel at 62 instead of 64, that cannot be refused! We can see the ulterior motives of the second: a “conclave” on pensions to avoid a motion of censure, even if it meant giving up budgetary ballast to ensure the support of the socialist deputies, it had to be invented!
Alas, the political turmoil has its reasons that economic reason ignores. However, even if this pleases neither the French nor their political representatives, in the end, it is the latter which prevails. There is no need to ask the Court of Auditors for yet another audit on pension financing: the data is known, let us remember.
The French, with an effective starting age of 62.4 years for men and 62.7 years for women, stop working two years than their German and Italian neighbors and a year and a half earlier than the European average. Only Luxembourg has an earlier retirement age than in France… Logically, pension expenditure burdens our economy even more than elsewhere: 14.4% of GDP, or two and a half points more than in the eurozone.
A debate far from closed
The problem is that our contributions only amount to 11% of GDP: the resulting deficit (3.4% of GDP) must be covered by taxes and debt. Finally, let us remember that life expectancy in France has continued to increase: +3.3 years on average since 1990 (83.1 years for men and 87.4 years for women). In these conditions, is it wise to reopen the pensions project? Do we at least have an idea of the cost of lowering the retirement age to 62 instead of 64? “All things being equal, this means that you spend two more years in retirement and two fewer years contributing,” explains Denis Ferrand, general director of Rexecode, “which would lead to an increase in the old-age contribution rate of 4.2 points.”
Hypersensitive and very divisive, the debate on pensions is far from over: it risks returning at a gallop in the next presidential campaign. The opportunity to broaden the focus to the question of work, and in particular the quantity of work in France. But the facts are stubborn: the French are lagging behind, even at the back of the European pack. “No matter how much we turn the equation in every direction, the observation is clear: 6 out of 10 French people do not work, because they are too young, in training, retired, unemployed…”, reports the essayist Denis Olivennes in a very well done little book (2). With effective working hours among the lowest in Europe and participation in the labor market among the lowest on the continent, the French accumulate disadvantages. Isn’t it urgent to do more education and less demagoguery on the subject?
(1) Elabe for BFMTV (January 2025).
(2) France must work more…, Albin Michel, 2025.
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