9 ms·

French Strike Aims to Save an Envied, but Convoluted, Approach to Pensions

35 points by koolba 7y ago

skitout 7y ago
This article is misleading (full disclosure, I am French and did protest against this last Thursday) This article talk mainly about "special pensions" from the public with privilege... For sure they will be the biggest losers and they are very vocal, but the law and the protest is about much more than that... This reform will impact everybody, people will have to work longer, possibly to get a lower pension. Women are particularly exposed here. Points system allows to more easily lower the value of the point... This has been done in Sweden, and former French Minister Filon told that is one main reason he likes the point system... With this new reform, life expectancy are not taken into consideration : a manager will live longer than an industrial worker on average ; with the same share of contribution he will benefits from the system longer than "poor people" in general People working longer means... a little bit more unemployment and more health expense for the workers (and more absenteeism for companies) as older worker have more health problem. So you save some money for retirement at the expense of other public spending... Some economists, like Thomas Piketty are very vocal against this "law"... It is a pity the NYT did such a poor job...
- ChuckNorris89 7y ago
  The European population is stagnating or shrinking so as a millennial I have little faith in ever receiving any pension when the time comes. Whoever doesn't have a plan B (inheritance, properties for rent) will be super fucked.
  - skitout 7y ago
    Automation, robots... Things are changing, so can the pension system... But this implies to share the value created by our society in a different way
    - ChuckNorris89 7y ago
      Except most of the profits from the productivity gains of automation have been going to off shore megacorp tax havens.
      - olivermarks 7y ago
        Globalization has plateaued and to keep the money coming in the megacorps require austerity, which is essentially what the Gillet Jeunes and these strikes are protesting. The NYT piece is typical of the under reporting and spin put on this reality by the corporate media
- PunchTornado 7y ago
  > People working longer means... a little bit more unemployment this is not proved or true. society is not as simple as that. they thought unemployment will drop if people worked only 35h a week, but it didn't. why don't you accept that people have to work longer? the population is not booming anymore so you cannot accept future generations to pay.
  - skitout 7y ago
    "why don't you accept that people have to work longer? the population is not booming anymore so you cannot accept future generations to pay. " Well that is a political choice. There are option possible where we don't work longer, and option where we work longer. According to the option money and worked are not shared in the same way. Both option are possible - e.g. different economist have different personal preference. The only think we have to is to have a debate, and a democratic decision.
    - PunchTornado 7y ago
      and will a democratic debate be achieved by mass protests in the street OR by elections? And Macron is an elected president. Instead of seeing who screams harder and who throws the bigger stones, lets see which politician is elected by the majority of French people.
      - skitout 7y ago
        Debate and a referendum would be the democratic way. Current French Republic was dubbed "presidential monarchy" (in no other democracy a single person had this level of power)... Since 2002 French President has even more power... And now with the extreme-right, who does not lose the first round of the presidential election (aside of extreme-right) win. Macron had been elected by 18% of voters, and have "full powers" for 5 years I personally don't think it is super democratic
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    As life expectancy increases, it seems eminently reasonable that a typical working career would be longer. [1]-https://www.ined.fr/en/everything_about_population/graphs-maps/interpreted-graphs/life-expectancy-france/ https://www.ined.fr/en/everything_about_population/graphs-ma...
- friedman23 7y ago
  Thomas Piketty isn't god because he wrote a book that agreed with yours and a bunch of journalist's priors.
  - skitout 7y ago
    Not saying he is god. Just saying that different people, including well-know experts, has different opinions... and that this article is misleading.
- privateSFacct 7y ago
  SNCF (the rail company) is something like $45 Billion in debt? Their conductors can retire using last 6 months of wages (vs avg wages)? They can retire at 52? So payments will go to 82 (france has great life expectancy) That's 30 YEARS of pension payments! They are guaranteed a job for life? They get free / low cost housing? They get 28 regular paid days off an maybe another 22 or so RTT days? (ie, 50 paid days off before any sick / unpaid etc). Not bad! These articles always start with a description of how hard the job is. In Europe they actually have great automated safety systems for trains and the trainsets are in good condition. I realize it's a hard job, but boy - my heart goes out to greyhound bus drivers in the US and many many other workers with no where NEAR these benefits and frankly much harder jobs. The special pension folks are in the streets to protect their special pensions. Tie getting rid of the special pensions (which are often for the elites) with an increase to basic pension and social safety net for all?
  - skitout 7y ago
    The protest is not about SNCF - they are only part of the pic. Let's talk about the pension reform in general, not about the SNCF (with some sloppy info btw)
    - user5994461 7y ago
      The protest is about all the special pensions, SNCF and the 50 other, they're all quite similar.
      - skitout 7y ago
        I was in the protest with my friend entrepreneur, tour-guide, teacher, unemployed, artist-assistant and a bartender... Special pension is only one point of many, and there are different ways to deal with it. Note that for some special pension people pay more on their wages every month, and that special pension was also a way to stay attractive on the employment market with low salary...
        privateSFacct 7y ago
PeterisP 7y ago
Here's a bit offtopic diverging from the original topic into climate change. This situation seems to be very relevant to various arguments for tackling climate change and other environmental issues by "stopping growth". Thing is, a very large share of capital assets that "require" (i.e. expect) growth is the various types of pension funds. Any politician that would actually implement policies that intentionally cut economic growth in order to save the planet (or any other purpose) will ensure that the math for their local retirement system can't work out any more, that some pension reform will be neccessary, admitting that the expected benefits can't be paid out because the expected growth didn't happen. And as this example shows, there will be literal riots on the streets if that's threatened. Also, compare this to earlier gilets jaunes riots initially sparkled by a fuel tax increase, or the Chile riots sparkled by an increase in cost of public transportation. Climate change isn't bringing large quantities of violent protesters on the streets, but requirement to make economic sacrifices definitely is. So it's naive to expect success in cutting growth and aggressively taxing fossil fuels to help climate change - the general population will not only vote against it, they will violently fight to ensure that this is not done. Any politician who's actually serious about implementing the economic changes needed to stop climate change should expect be forcibly removed from power by a large part of their population which won't (and in many cases, can't, they're the poorer part of their society) tolerate short-term economic sacrifices. It's kind of sad, I don't know what can be done about this, but at least we should be aware about this issue when discussing any proposals that are supposed to be realistic.
- skitout 7y ago
  1. You are only talking about growth... We could also talked about how the GDP, the capital and the work is shared... You can have lower growth, but most people having more 2. Doing massive investment in favor of the climate (and against fossil fuel) would create a lot of wealth and job 3. Since the 70's they've been an augmentation in inequality, and most people live in an higher economic insecurity... The system seems unfair for most people. This is normal that people does not agree to do unfair sacrifice, while the top 20% of the people live a comfortable life... that does not means they are not ready to radical change
- 11235813213455 7y ago
hpoe 7y ago
So I won't say whose side I am on, or where I stand on social policies, but I think it is important for both sides of the aisle to realize that once you give people any sort of entitlement, it becomes exactly that an entitlement that people feel entitled to. By so doing you make incredibly difficult if not impossible to ever introduce any changes to it later no matter what is going on, wars, natural disasters, etc. In the end short term thinking by politicians wishing to cash in on votes no matter what they are voting for will end up hurting things far more than someone who takes a long term perspective.
- tehjoker 7y ago
  That's the point. It is the well to do and the bosses that cry over giving the people more, allowing them to relax, allowing them to be free of the tyranny of the markets. To not give the people, meaning the majority, what they demand is profoundly anti-democratic.
  - zozbot234 7y ago
    > giving the people more, allowing them to relax, allowing them to be free of the tyranny of the markets The only possible way to meet these goals sustainably is to propel economic growth. If you want people to escape "the tyranny of the market", you need more market, not less of it! Work smarter, not harder. And France has a lot of wasted potential for GDP growth, that could be tapped by reforming all sorts of misguided government policies. There's no inherent reason why France couldn't become as wealthy as e.g. the Netherlands, or even more.
    - tehjoker 7y ago
      The inequality charts would beg to differ. We need redistribution. There is an army of unemployed labor and underutilized factories and other facilities. The market is profoundly irrational at allocating resources to meet human need. With a democratically run economy, we will fully utilize the entire working population while cutting individuals some slack by reducing working hours, increasing safety, and ensuring pensions will be kept. We will do away with the unelected oligarchy that rules this planet.
rayiner 7y ago
> The state would remain the main guarantor of pensions, continuing to provide workers with a safety net that is unheard-of in the United States, where about half of Americans have no access to retirement savings plans, and have little or nothing saved for retirement. This is weasel-speak. It’s strictly true, only because it’s worded in a way to exclude Social Security. Taken as a whole, US retirement safety net is more generous than the OECD average: https://www.etk.fi/en/the-pension-system/international-comparison/pension-levels/ https://www.etk.fi/en/the-pension-system/international-compa... The above is OECD data, far more reliable than random assertions in the NYT. Public and private pensions replace on average 70% of pre-retirement income for an average-income person, compared to 60% in France (and the OECD as a whole). Great Britain and Germany are even less. (And of course, because US incomes are higher to start with, US retirement income is even higher in absolute terms. The average French pension payment is $1,500 per month, about the same as the average Social Security payment. But the average American worker gets about that much again in occupational pension. (See the break-down in the chart above, showing 100% of French pension coming from statutory pension, versus half of US pension coming from statutory pension.)
- user5994461 7y ago
  >>> The average French pension payment is $1,500 per month For reference, French minimum wage is currently around 1200€ a month, with most workers earning around 1200-2000 because salaries are heavily index to the minimum. It's one of the numerous issues with the pension system, pensions are comparable to full salaries.
- TulliusCicero 7y ago
  > And of course, because US incomes are higher to start with, US retirement income is even higher in absolute terms. On the other hand, cost of living is undoubtedly lower in France and Germany, especially healthcare. Yes, there's a government healthcare plan for seniors in the US, but IIRC it's not nearly as generous as the plans you see in western Europe.
- boulos 7y ago
  This was a great read! I went on to skim the latest Pensions at a Glance [1] report from just last week, which drives your point home [2]: > When voluntary private pensions are taken into account for the whole career in Belgium, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States the average replacement, for these ten countries, is 58% for an average earner compared with 36% when only mandatory schemes are considered. The voluntary component has the largest impact on the replacement rate (more than 29 percentage points) in Ireland, the United Kingdom and the United States. Note that this is also gross (before taxes) and since tax rates are lower (in the US at least) for this cohort during retirement, most particularly by not paying into Social Security (roughly 15% of employee plus employer contributions for people making less than $120k/yr) the numbers are understated. The section on net replacement sadly doesn't include voluntary pensions. [1] http://www.oecd.org/pensions/oecd-pensions-at-a-glance-19991363.htm http://www.oecd.org/pensions/oecd-pensions-at-a-glance-19991... [2] https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org//sites/b6d3dcfc-en/1/2/5/4/index.html?itemId=/content/publication/b6d3dcfc-en&mimeType=text/html&_csp_=a8e95975da55b0299df9e90b37215621&itemIGO=oecd&itemContentType=book# https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org//sites/b6d3dcfc-en/1/2/5/4/ind...
PunchTornado 7y ago
I find it unbelievable that train drivers can retire at 52 and they are now protesting for this "right". And there are also other people who are supporting them. I hope Macron stands by his policies and doesn't back off. I have no clue what the French people expect from their future. Don't they see that all macro variables have changed? declining population, ageing, higher life expectancy, major economic shift to Asia etc.
- skitout 7y ago
  Most protestors don't want train driver to retire at 52... most protestors just don't want a system where everybody has to work longer, for less (despite a high rate of unemployment)...
- user5994461 7y ago
  Bear in mind that there are millions of people directly affected by the special pensions. It's really deep rooted in the French nation. They are heavily manifesting against any change to pensions because they are first targeted and have the most to lose, but there are many more people manifesting that simply don't want to have to work longer. Nobody approaching 60 want to be told they have to work a few years more and/or receive a lower allowance.
tehjoker 7y ago
Goodbye austerity! Goodbye the rich! Goodbye capitalism! Vive la liberté, l'égalité et la fraternité.
- wazoox 7y ago
  Precisely. Bernard Arnault had his fortune doubled for no good reason in the past year. Give the money back, you robber.
alkonaut 7y ago
If train drivers have their own pension system (meaning they both contribute to, and cash out from it) and they contribute so much each year that they can cash out at 57, then I can see the outrage if they suddenly need to work 10 more years. But if the train drivers don’t contribute more than some other group but still get another ten years of retirement compared to other groups - then I’d be outraged if I was part of the other groups which effectively subsidize the luxury of a very early retirement. That said, it’s always tricky to change old systems even when they are bad. There may be people who chose between a much better paying job and driving trains because they knew about the pension benefit etc. These types of systems may need to be phased out (e.g raise the retirement age of train drivers one year every two years).
- user5994461 7y ago
  To answer your interrogation, it's not train drivers that are funding most of their pension nowadays, it's the other tax payers that are paying. Short summary of the French pension system is that everybody is contributing a percentage of their earning to the state. (There is no private pension fund, it's only a single giant national pool). If you're part of a few select entities (like the national railway) you simply get more benefits from the state, but you do not pay more. The special pensions are typically in deep deficit between what their workers contribute and what they benefit back. They're only covered financially so far (by the tax payer) because pensions are ultimately a single giant pool in the national budget.
- skitout 7y ago
  @user5994461 is wrong Train worker do pays "much more" every month for their special pension... But currently this is not enough and the system is heavily subsidized... But the biggest part of this disequilibrium is that there use to be a lot of rail workers (so a lot are retiree now), and now not so much. If they had no special treatment but a separate pension system, most of the problem would be there too...
  - user5994461 7y ago
    I'd disagree with "much" unless you can show numbers saying how much they pay. Noting there is a variation of up to 5% in contribution depending on personal situation (including status cadre and other stuff). I have family working in national research centers and they contribute less than in the private sector (about 3%). Due to some historical agreement that's waving some mandatory contributions for all personnel of that institution.

35 points by koolba 7y ago

This article is misleading (full disclosure, I am French and did protest against this last Thursday) This article talk mainly about "special pensions" from the public with privilege... For sure they will be the biggest losers and they are very vocal, but the law and the protest is about much more than that... This reform will impact everybody, people will have to work longer, possibly to get a lower pension. Women are particularly exposed here. Points system allows to more easily lower the value of the point... This has been done in Sweden, and former French Minister Filon told that is one main reason he likes the point system... With this new reform, life expectancy are not taken into consideration : a manager will live longer than an industrial worker on average ; with the same share of contribution he will benefits from the system longer than "poor people" in general People working longer means... a little bit more unemployment and more health expense for the workers (and more absenteeism for companies) as older worker have more health problem. So you save some money for retirement at the expense of other public spending... Some economists, like Thomas Piketty are very vocal against this "law"... It is a pity the NYT did such a poor job...

ChuckNorris89 7y ago
The European population is stagnating or shrinking so as a millennial I have little faith in ever receiving any pension when the time comes. Whoever doesn't have a plan B (inheritance, properties for rent) will be super fucked.
- skitout 7y ago
  Automation, robots... Things are changing, so can the pension system... But this implies to share the value created by our society in a different way
  - ChuckNorris89 7y ago
    Except most of the profits from the productivity gains of automation have been going to off shore megacorp tax havens.
    - olivermarks 7y ago
      Globalization has plateaued and to keep the money coming in the megacorps require austerity, which is essentially what the Gillet Jeunes and these strikes are protesting. The NYT piece is typical of the under reporting and spin put on this reality by the corporate media
PunchTornado 7y ago
> People working longer means... a little bit more unemployment this is not proved or true. society is not as simple as that. they thought unemployment will drop if people worked only 35h a week, but it didn't. why don't you accept that people have to work longer? the population is not booming anymore so you cannot accept future generations to pay.
- skitout 7y ago
  "why don't you accept that people have to work longer? the population is not booming anymore so you cannot accept future generations to pay. " Well that is a political choice. There are option possible where we don't work longer, and option where we work longer. According to the option money and worked are not shared in the same way. Both option are possible - e.g. different economist have different personal preference. The only think we have to is to have a debate, and a democratic decision.
  - PunchTornado 7y ago
    and will a democratic debate be achieved by mass protests in the street OR by elections? And Macron is an elected president. Instead of seeing who screams harder and who throws the bigger stones, lets see which politician is elected by the majority of French people.
    - skitout 7y ago
      Debate and a referendum would be the democratic way. Current French Republic was dubbed "presidential monarchy" (in no other democracy a single person had this level of power)... Since 2002 French President has even more power... And now with the extreme-right, who does not lose the first round of the presidential election (aside of extreme-right) win. Macron had been elected by 18% of voters, and have "full powers" for 5 years I personally don't think it is super democratic
- sokoloff 7y ago
  As life expectancy increases, it seems eminently reasonable that a typical working career would be longer. [1]-https://www.ined.fr/en/everything_about_population/graphs-maps/interpreted-graphs/life-expectancy-france/ https://www.ined.fr/en/everything_about_population/graphs-ma...
friedman23 7y ago
Thomas Piketty isn't god because he wrote a book that agreed with yours and a bunch of journalist's priors.
- skitout 7y ago
  Not saying he is god. Just saying that different people, including well-know experts, has different opinions... and that this article is misleading.
privateSFacct 7y ago
SNCF (the rail company) is something like $45 Billion in debt? Their conductors can retire using last 6 months of wages (vs avg wages)? They can retire at 52? So payments will go to 82 (france has great life expectancy) That's 30 YEARS of pension payments! They are guaranteed a job for life? They get free / low cost housing? They get 28 regular paid days off an maybe another 22 or so RTT days? (ie, 50 paid days off before any sick / unpaid etc). Not bad! These articles always start with a description of how hard the job is. In Europe they actually have great automated safety systems for trains and the trainsets are in good condition. I realize it's a hard job, but boy - my heart goes out to greyhound bus drivers in the US and many many other workers with no where NEAR these benefits and frankly much harder jobs. The special pension folks are in the streets to protect their special pensions. Tie getting rid of the special pensions (which are often for the elites) with an increase to basic pension and social safety net for all?
- skitout 7y ago
  The protest is not about SNCF - they are only part of the pic. Let's talk about the pension reform in general, not about the SNCF (with some sloppy info btw)
  - user5994461 7y ago
    The protest is about all the special pensions, SNCF and the 50 other, they're all quite similar.
    - skitout 7y ago
      I was in the protest with my friend entrepreneur, tour-guide, teacher, unemployed, artist-assistant and a bartender... Special pension is only one point of many, and there are different ways to deal with it. Note that for some special pension people pay more on their wages every month, and that special pension was also a way to stay attractive on the employment market with low salary...
      - privateSFacct 7y ago

PeterisP 7y ago

Here's a bit offtopic diverging from the original topic into climate change. This situation seems to be very relevant to various arguments for tackling climate change and other environmental issues by "stopping growth". Thing is, a very large share of capital assets that "require" (i.e. expect) growth is the various types of pension funds. Any politician that would actually implement policies that intentionally cut economic growth in order to save the planet (or any other purpose) will ensure that the math for their local retirement system can't work out any more, that some pension reform will be neccessary, admitting that the expected benefits can't be paid out because the expected growth didn't happen. And as this example shows, there will be literal riots on the streets if that's threatened. Also, compare this to earlier gilets jaunes riots initially sparkled by a fuel tax increase, or the Chile riots sparkled by an increase in cost of public transportation. Climate change isn't bringing large quantities of violent protesters on the streets, but requirement to make economic sacrifices definitely is. So it's naive to expect success in cutting growth and aggressively taxing fossil fuels to help climate change - the general population will not only vote against it, they will violently fight to ensure that this is not done. Any politician who's actually serious about implementing the economic changes needed to stop climate change should expect be forcibly removed from power by a large part of their population which won't (and in many cases, can't, they're the poorer part of their society) tolerate short-term economic sacrifices. It's kind of sad, I don't know what can be done about this, but at least we should be aware about this issue when discussing any proposals that are supposed to be realistic.

skitout 7y ago
1. You are only talking about growth... We could also talked about how the GDP, the capital and the work is shared... You can have lower growth, but most people having more 2. Doing massive investment in favor of the climate (and against fossil fuel) would create a lot of wealth and job 3. Since the 70's they've been an augmentation in inequality, and most people live in an higher economic insecurity... The system seems unfair for most people. This is normal that people does not agree to do unfair sacrifice, while the top 20% of the people live a comfortable life... that does not means they are not ready to radical change
11235813213455 7y ago

hpoe 7y ago

So I won't say whose side I am on, or where I stand on social policies, but I think it is important for both sides of the aisle to realize that once you give people any sort of entitlement, it becomes exactly that an entitlement that people feel entitled to. By so doing you make incredibly difficult if not impossible to ever introduce any changes to it later no matter what is going on, wars, natural disasters, etc. In the end short term thinking by politicians wishing to cash in on votes no matter what they are voting for will end up hurting things far more than someone who takes a long term perspective.

tehjoker 7y ago
That's the point. It is the well to do and the bosses that cry over giving the people more, allowing them to relax, allowing them to be free of the tyranny of the markets. To not give the people, meaning the majority, what they demand is profoundly anti-democratic.
- zozbot234 7y ago
  > giving the people more, allowing them to relax, allowing them to be free of the tyranny of the markets The only possible way to meet these goals sustainably is to propel economic growth. If you want people to escape "the tyranny of the market", you need more market, not less of it! Work smarter, not harder. And France has a lot of wasted potential for GDP growth, that could be tapped by reforming all sorts of misguided government policies. There's no inherent reason why France couldn't become as wealthy as e.g. the Netherlands, or even more.
  - tehjoker 7y ago
    The inequality charts would beg to differ. We need redistribution. There is an army of unemployed labor and underutilized factories and other facilities. The market is profoundly irrational at allocating resources to meet human need. With a democratically run economy, we will fully utilize the entire working population while cutting individuals some slack by reducing working hours, increasing safety, and ensuring pensions will be kept. We will do away with the unelected oligarchy that rules this planet.

rayiner 7y ago

> The state would remain the main guarantor of pensions, continuing to provide workers with a safety net that is unheard-of in the United States, where about half of Americans have no access to retirement savings plans, and have little or nothing saved for retirement. This is weasel-speak. It’s strictly true, only because it’s worded in a way to exclude Social Security. Taken as a whole, US retirement safety net is more generous than the OECD average: https://www.etk.fi/en/the-pension-system/international-comparison/pension-levels/ https://www.etk.fi/en/the-pension-system/international-compa... The above is OECD data, far more reliable than random assertions in the NYT. Public and private pensions replace on average 70% of pre-retirement income for an average-income person, compared to 60% in France (and the OECD as a whole). Great Britain and Germany are even less. (And of course, because US incomes are higher to start with, US retirement income is even higher in absolute terms. The average French pension payment is $1,500 per month, about the same as the average Social Security payment. But the average American worker gets about that much again in occupational pension. (See the break-down in the chart above, showing 100% of French pension coming from statutory pension, versus half of US pension coming from statutory pension.)

user5994461 7y ago
>>> The average French pension payment is $1,500 per month For reference, French minimum wage is currently around 1200€ a month, with most workers earning around 1200-2000 because salaries are heavily index to the minimum. It's one of the numerous issues with the pension system, pensions are comparable to full salaries.
TulliusCicero 7y ago
> And of course, because US incomes are higher to start with, US retirement income is even higher in absolute terms. On the other hand, cost of living is undoubtedly lower in France and Germany, especially healthcare. Yes, there's a government healthcare plan for seniors in the US, but IIRC it's not nearly as generous as the plans you see in western Europe.
boulos 7y ago
This was a great read! I went on to skim the latest Pensions at a Glance [1] report from just last week, which drives your point home [2]: > When voluntary private pensions are taken into account for the whole career in Belgium, Canada, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States the average replacement, for these ten countries, is 58% for an average earner compared with 36% when only mandatory schemes are considered. The voluntary component has the largest impact on the replacement rate (more than 29 percentage points) in Ireland, the United Kingdom and the United States. Note that this is also gross (before taxes) and since tax rates are lower (in the US at least) for this cohort during retirement, most particularly by not paying into Social Security (roughly 15% of employee plus employer contributions for people making less than $120k/yr) the numbers are understated. The section on net replacement sadly doesn't include voluntary pensions. [1] http://www.oecd.org/pensions/oecd-pensions-at-a-glance-19991363.htm http://www.oecd.org/pensions/oecd-pensions-at-a-glance-19991... [2] https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org//sites/b6d3dcfc-en/1/2/5/4/index.html?itemId=/content/publication/b6d3dcfc-en&mimeType=text/html&_csp_=a8e95975da55b0299df9e90b37215621&itemIGO=oecd&itemContentType=book# https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org//sites/b6d3dcfc-en/1/2/5/4/ind...

PunchTornado 7y ago

I find it unbelievable that train drivers can retire at 52 and they are now protesting for this "right". And there are also other people who are supporting them. I hope Macron stands by his policies and doesn't back off. I have no clue what the French people expect from their future. Don't they see that all macro variables have changed? declining population, ageing, higher life expectancy, major economic shift to Asia etc.

skitout 7y ago
Most protestors don't want train driver to retire at 52... most protestors just don't want a system where everybody has to work longer, for less (despite a high rate of unemployment)...
user5994461 7y ago
Bear in mind that there are millions of people directly affected by the special pensions. It's really deep rooted in the French nation. They are heavily manifesting against any change to pensions because they are first targeted and have the most to lose, but there are many more people manifesting that simply don't want to have to work longer. Nobody approaching 60 want to be told they have to work a few years more and/or receive a lower allowance.

tehjoker 7y ago

Goodbye austerity! Goodbye the rich! Goodbye capitalism! Vive la liberté, l'égalité et la fraternité.

wazoox 7y ago
Precisely. Bernard Arnault had his fortune doubled for no good reason in the past year. Give the money back, you robber.

alkonaut 7y ago

If train drivers have their own pension system (meaning they both contribute to, and cash out from it) and they contribute so much each year that they can cash out at 57, then I can see the outrage if they suddenly need to work 10 more years. But if the train drivers don’t contribute more than some other group but still get another ten years of retirement compared to other groups - then I’d be outraged if I was part of the other groups which effectively subsidize the luxury of a very early retirement. That said, it’s always tricky to change old systems even when they are bad. There may be people who chose between a much better paying job and driving trains because they knew about the pension benefit etc. These types of systems may need to be phased out (e.g raise the retirement age of train drivers one year every two years).

user5994461 7y ago
To answer your interrogation, it's not train drivers that are funding most of their pension nowadays, it's the other tax payers that are paying. Short summary of the French pension system is that everybody is contributing a percentage of their earning to the state. (There is no private pension fund, it's only a single giant national pool). If you're part of a few select entities (like the national railway) you simply get more benefits from the state, but you do not pay more. The special pensions are typically in deep deficit between what their workers contribute and what they benefit back. They're only covered financially so far (by the tax payer) because pensions are ultimately a single giant pool in the national budget.
skitout 7y ago
@user5994461 is wrong Train worker do pays "much more" every month for their special pension... But currently this is not enough and the system is heavily subsidized... But the biggest part of this disequilibrium is that there use to be a lot of rail workers (so a lot are retiree now), and now not so much. If they had no special treatment but a separate pension system, most of the problem would be there too...
- user5994461 7y ago
  I'd disagree with "much" unless you can show numbers saying how much they pay. Noting there is a variation of up to 5% in contribution depending on personal situation (including status cadre and other stuff). I have family working in national research centers and they contribute less than in the private sector (about 3%). Due to some historical agreement that's waving some mandatory contributions for all personnel of that institution.