It was one of Emmanuel Macron’s promises during the 2022 presidential campaign: bringing the unemployment rate to 5 %, a threshold symbolizing full employment. However, France is still far enough, with a current unemployment rate of 7.3 %, and more than 100,000 new registered in France work in 2024, according to data published by The Ministry of Labor end of January.
Despite this situation, the Economic Analysis Council (CAE), a college of economists of different sensitivities which advises the government, does not give up this objective. According to a study Published Tuesday, March 4, reaching full employment would require an increase in the number of workers on the market, targeting young people and seniors in particular.
A lower employment rate than elsewhere
The study highlights key data: France has fewer people in employment than other comparable countries. On average, a Frenchman (between 16 and 74 years old) works 1,000 hours per year, or 100 hours less than in Germany or in the United Kingdom, and almost 300 hours less than in the United States. This gap is not linked to weekly working time in France, but is explained by a employment rate – namely the relationship between the number of people in employment and the total population – lower than elsewhere.
For the CAE, two categories of the population are particularly concerned: young people and seniors, which present in France lower employment rates than with our neighbors. For comparison, in France, a high proportion of young people is exclusively in studies, while in Germany and the United Kingdom, they combine employment and training more often. Integration into the labor market is also more complicated: two years after the end of their studies, young French people who have left the school system at 18 have a lower employment rate of 15 points to that of young Germans, and 30 points to that of the British.
Regarding seniors, if France has caught up for the 55-59 age group (now exceeding the United Kingdom and the United States), it remains lagging behind in the 60-64 year old category, with an employment rate of around 45 %, against 65 % in Germany, for example.
Make more people work rather than lengthen working time
The challenge, according to the CAE, is therefore not to increase the working time of employees already in office (by reducing leave, deregulation of schedules or tax exemption from overtime), but to bring more people into the labor market.
The study highlights two levers: encourage the use of seniors, extending the active life of those who can, and better support the professional integration of young people, in particular the least trained. Indeed, the study highlights a specific problem for France: the amount of working hours carried out by low -skilled employees collapsed by 40 % in thirty years.