Pensions: we must "at a minimum" preserve the retirement age at 64, or even "push it a little further", says Patrick Martin

The Medef is fiercely defending the 64-year-old age. The president of the main employers' organization, Patrick Martin, said on Sunday that the legal retirement age should be "at a minimum" maintained at 64, or even "pushed a little further" , in an interview given to the Journal du Dimanche . "At a minimum, let's preserve the legal retirement age at 64. If we were realistic, we should perhaps even push it a little further" , declared Patrick Martin in the pages of the JDD , while negotiations will open on Thursday between employers and unions to amend the highly contested 2023 pension reform, which had raised the legal retirement age from 62 to 64. "The Court of Auditors has done the calculation: if we lower the legal age to 63, this will increase the deficit by 13 billion per year by 2035. At the very least, if we push the cursor to 65, this will reduce the deficit by about the same amount. It's arithmetic!" he judges, considering that "we must preserve the pension reform and, in the long term, expand it."

The negotiations between social partners, to whom the government has given until "the beginning of June" , are expected to be difficult, given the antagonistic positions. For the unions, the priority is to go back to 64 years. The employers' organization, however, excludes any increase in their financial contribution. "If we want, in the long term, to ensure retirement pensions at the same level as today, and therefore preserve the standard of living of retirees, there are not 50 solutions: either we increase the contributions of companies and employees - for us, it's a no - (...) or we increase the contribution period" , he insists. "All studies show that the retirement age is the most effective measure to achieve this objective, and above all the most beneficial to the economy and employment" , affirms the "boss of the bosses" . He also denounces a "collective myopia" and considers "incomprehensible" the decision to reverse the pension reform of the former Prime Minister, Élisabeth Borne. It "had been digested willingly or unwillingly by public opinion" , believes Patrick Martin.

Patrick Martin also insisted on the need for "unity among employers" on the subject of pensions, a few days after his counterpart from the CPME, Amir Reza-Tofighi, declared himself ready to consider a return to retirement at 63 , provided that this measure is accompanied by an automatic indexation of the retirement age on life expectancy. Amir Reza-Tofighi advocates "working more" , "adding a funded pension" and aligning the CSG of retirees with that of active workers. "When we make proposals, we must be able to evaluate them precisely. To date, Medef experts and economists have not found a better solution than postponing the age limit" , replied Patrick Martin.

On Sunday, speaking to Franceinfo, the Minister for Labor and Employment, Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet, regretted that the idea proposed by the CPME to introduce a share of capitalization into the system was "taboo in social discussions." "We have 15 million French people today who are capitalizing, (...) it is absolutely not taboo for the French" and "it must be part of the topics of discussion," she judged.