It’s a French pathology: for each politically explosive subject, a contraption. Hear a “council”, a “committee”, a “high commission”. Or better still a “high authority”. Whatever the name, as long as there is the objective: the establishment of a weighed and independent diagnosis. While the future of the French pension system has been rotting political debate for almost forty years, we have still not managed to collectively make an impartial judgment on the subject. However, we do not count the number of these “thingies” created in recent decades.
In 2000, the Pensions Orientation Council (COR) was inaugurated by Lionel Jospin with the aim of giving birth to projections on the financial balance in the short and medium term. It is clear that the latest report of this institution has above all hysterized the debate. In 2010, alongside the postponement of the legal retirement age from 60 to 62, Nicolas Sarkozy created the Pensions Steering Committee – the Copilor for insiders – responsible for ensuring the financial sustainability of the system. It met twice before falling into oblivion.
Rebelote in 2014 at the time of the so-called Touraine reform with the Superior Pensions Council. The objective: to put forward proposals to ensure the sustainability of the regime. Problem, this famous CSR whose next report is expected in mid-July is based on projections made by the COR, which are far from reaching consensus. While the devil bites his own tail, demagoguery and easy solutions thrive.