Pensions: 2020 deficits already reached
While the Conseil d'orientation des retraites forecast an all-scheme deficit of 25ébillion à by 2020, this level is déjà dépassé today. Hence the government's determinationé to take measures à with rapid effect, such as the relèvement of the âge légal de départ.
The crisis has so éwobbledé the équilibrium of the pension system that preévisions of déficits have been totally overturnedées. In 2010, all compulsory schemes are expected to have an overall funding requirement in excess of é25 billion euros, if we add together the deficits of the basic scheme for private-sector employees (over 10 billion), the Fonds de solidarité vieillesse (3.9 billion), the Agirc-Arrco supplementary schemes (3.4 billion, excluding financial results), the civil service (10 billion), and subtracting the remaining surpluses from à CNRACL (local authority employees) and à Ircantec (non-tenured state employees).
The latest forecasts produced by the Conseil d'orientation des retraites (COR) in 2007 are therefore totally outdated. They forecast a funding requirement of €24.8 billion in 2020 (see chart), with the unemployment rate reduced to 4.5% by 2015. The crisis has brought the échéances ten years closer together, making it all the more difficult to implement the réform. COR is due to publish new forecasts in April (after the regional éelections) on financing requirements in 2020 and 2050. They will évidently be even more worryingé
Equité entre régimes
At Tuesday's hearing at the Sénat, Labor Minister Xavier Darcos emphasized the growing financing needs associated with the pensions of civil servants. These are in fact« maskedés » by the obligation « d'équilibrage automatique »du compte spécial des pensions de l'Etat. The figure of 10 billion euros for civil service pensions does not correspond éto a deficit that has been recordedébut to the additional charges that the State has had to assume since 2000 at that time, the State was paying the éequivalent of 44 % of charges on employees' salaries to pay pensions, compared with 62 % today. Hence Xavier Darcos' insistence on « acting » firmly this yearéon civil servant pensions.
« Le gouvernement lance une véritable charge contre le régime des retraites de la fonction publique d'Etat, réagit Bernard Devy (FO). Certainly, we will have to examine the inégalités between the régimes, but be careful not to stigmatize the civil service. » Civil servants' pensions are « not always as advantageous as they are made out to be », stresses the union official, particularly for those, many of them, who have contributedé less than fifteen years in the public sector.
At the Ministry of Social Affairs, we are reassured by the Minister's comments : this does not mean that the special features of the civil service scheme will necessarily be abolished, in particular the rule that pensions are calculated on the basis of the last six months of salary - and not twenty-five years as in the private sector. But the principle of équité between régimes will guide the réform.
More generally, the faster-than-forecast rise in deficits will prompt the government à to raise the âge légal de départ sans pénalité, currently fixedé à sixty years. A very sensitive measure, but one that would have a faster effect on the accounts (around 5 billion euros in économies for a switch to à sixty-two) than an increase in the duration of contributions. The relèvement of the âage of retirement will involve taking into account the pénibilité of certain people (for some employees, the édépart à sixty years could êbe maintained). Provided, explains Xavier Darcos (read above), that these working conditions have an objective impact on life expectancy.
.Source: Les échos
