It is a sensitive question which returns to the center of the political debate and crystallizes the opposition between candidates for the presidential election: the reform of the pension system. The proposal of candidate Emmanuel Macron, to push back the retirement age to 65 years old – once morest 62 years old currently -, did not fail to make his opponents react. Like the trade unions, they denounced, for the most part, a measure “unfair” for workers in “choked careers” or doing arduous jobs.
For the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen, who wants to establish the retirement age at 60 for people who started working before the age of 20 and set a maximum contribution period of forty-two years, “Emmanuel Macron wants to make the French pay for his incompetence”. “With him, it’s always up to the people to sacrifice themselves”, she tweeted, Wednesday evening. The RN candidate estimated on Thursday that it was a measure “deeply unfair”.
On the left, all opposed to raising the retirement age
Same opposition on the left. The leader of La France insoumise Jean-Luc Mélenchon displayed, on Thursday, his “absolute disagreement”. “I am for retirement at 60 at full rate”he recalled at the microphone of RMC. “For those who have a full career, no more retirement below the minimum wage” if he is elected, he also promised. Communist candidate Fabien Roussel, who also wants to lower the legal retirement age to 60, also felt in a tweetThursday morning, that “Those who demand that retirement be increased to 65 forget that at that age, more than 25% of the poorest have already died”.
Socialist Anne Hidalgo for her part denounced “fundamental hypocrisy” on France Inter, Thursday. She argued that her priority “is to guarantee people who have worked all their lives, an income”, “a right to rest”, “which allows them to live with dignity” of their retirement. She wants to maintain the starting age at 62 and reintroduce hardship criteria.
What the ecologist Yannick Jadot also wants to do, who also mentions a measure “extremely unfair” . “We are a country where the work of seniors is very, very badly treated. We are one of the countries with the lowest activity rates for seniors. Whose fault is it ? To companies that get rid of big salaries at the end of their careers »denounced the EELV candidate on Europe 1.
Union outcry
The trade unions also expressed their views following this proposal. After reacting to the WorldWednesday evening, the boss of the CFDT, Laurent Berger, once more denounced Thursday, during a press briefing, a measure “unfair” and ” brutal “ that the confederation intends “fight”. “Pulling back the legal retirement age penalizes the most choppy careers, (…) arduous jobs, those who started working young”he said.
Asked regarding the words of the President of Parliament Richard Ferrand, according to which it will remain possible to leave at 62, for careers “long, intense, exhausting”Mr. Berger noted that today the people concerned “can leave at 60”. “So for them too there will be a postponement”, he argued. The secretary general of the union nevertheless recalled that his organization was not in favor of lowering the retirement age to 60, as proposed by the PCF and LFI candidates.
As for the other unions, this measure is just as irritating. “Any attempt to impose the raising of the retirement age would lead to the construction of very strong social mobilizations”warned Catherine Perret, for the CGT. “We will be on the government’s road if it wants to raise the legal age”also warned Michel Beaugas of Force Ouvrière (FO), castigating a measure “dogmatic”which would only generate “false economies” by deferring the cost to other social benefits.
This reform “we proposed it”, defends Pécresse
The incumbent head of state is not, however, the only candidate in the presidential election to want to push back the retirement age. On the right, Valérie Pécresse also pleads for a departure at 65, and, on the far right, Eric Zemmour wants to bring it to 64. In a tweetcandidate LR thus lambasted on Wednesday evening that the head of state resumed ” to “ measure : “Retirement at 65, we proposed it, Macron did not! “.
The theme of pensions, coupled with that of purchasing power, has been a particularly sensitive subject since the social crisis of the “yellow vests” (2018-2019) and the major union demonstrations in the fall of 2019, conducted once morest the reform that had started during the mandate of Mr. Macron before being suspended in March 2020 and then abandoned, due to the Covid-19 crisis.
But the candidate president has pledged, if re-elected in April, to relaunch this vast reform. This is’“societal choice”in order to “finance protection for the French and [d’]invest for [eux]»without increasing taxes, and therefore “working more”, summarized the government spokesman Gabriel Attal, Thursday, March 10 on RTL. An argument similar to that deployed by the President of the National Assembly Richard Ferrand, who also defended the measure proposed by the Head of State, Thursday, during a great oral of the candidates (or their representatives) organized by CFDT.
If, at the start of the five-year term, the objective of the Head of State was not to call into question the current rule of 62 years, but to establish a pivotal age, today he proposes to put in place, during a second term, a gradual extension between now and « 2032 » from retirement age to 65, “a minimum pension of 1,100 euros” for full careers, and the “removal of the main special regimes”.
