It’s no. Emmanuel Macron refused on Thursday to implement a universal income for students during an impromptu exchange with young people in Paris on Thursday. “There is no country that helps students more than France on a social level” but “I am not in favor of saying, at 18, we have the right to a universal income without obligation », affirmed the President of the Republic.
“I believe in qualifying studies to get a job and, behind that, I believe in work. And one of the problems we have in our country today is that we also have a whole generation who had an RSA [revenu de solidarité active, destiné aux personnes sans ressources] and who is still prevented from going to work or who has become unaccustomed to going to work,” he explained. “I am in favor of improving the system. But I am not for an unconditional universal income,” he added, saying he was in favor of “more control over attendance at exams and success in exams.”
“Many foreign students” appeal for food aid
“Because today we also distribute a lot of scholarships to students who do not go there [aux examens]. In the queues for food aid, we also have a lot of foreign students,” he argued. But, he admitted, “there are still too many students who are in precarious circumstances, especially in big cities where housing is expensive.”
He hoped “one, that we help to develop studies in cities where it is less expensive. Two, that we finally have the answer – this is where we are not good – on student housing. We need to bring down the price of student accommodation. Three, that we have student jobs, when necessary, adapted to studies.
Fourteen university presidents called in September in a column published by The world to the creation of a “study allowance for all students”, in order to “curb poverty”, facilitate “the development of autonomy” of young people and their access to higher education.