Despite the significant mobilization Thursday in the street, the executive continues to defend its pension reform. And this Sunday, it is once again up to the Minister of Labor to go to the front, in the JDD, to promote a reform intended to “restore a maximum of equality”. On the eve of the presentation of the text in the Council of Ministers, Olivier Dussopt confirms in passing that the increase in small pensions will also concern current retirees.
The bill “will include the revaluation of small pensions for current retirees who have worked all their lives at the minimum wage, not just future ones”, who will receive “an increase in their pension of up to 100 euros per month “. This will concern around 200,000 new retirees per year and “1.8 million current retirees”, he specifies, against the two million mentioned so far.
“This reform is redistributive”, insists Olivier Dussopt, quoting the impact study of the bill, which “shows an increase of almost 5% for the 20% lowest pensions, against less than 1% for the 20% highest pensions”. As for women’s pensions, still according to the impact study, “eventually” its increase “will be twice as large as that which men will experience (+ 2.2% against + 0.9%)”.
According to the minister, “there are no losers”
Despite raising the legal age from 62 to 64, the actual starting age is 62.9 today and “in reality will only shift by about six months on average, and only three months for those who have the lowest pensions” thanks to the device in favor of long careers, argues the minister. According to him, in this reform “there are no losers”.
Asked whether it is not unfair that workers who started contributing at age 20 must always contribute at 44 and not 43, the Minister replied that some “are leaving today after 44 years of contributions when the law requires only 42”. “We are closing this gap,” he insists.
With this reform, “we have achieved our objective: to restore as much equality as possible”, sums up Olivier Dussopt. It also underlines that with the maintenance of the retirement age at full rate at 67 years, “the gap between the minimum duration and the maximum duration of work to leave at full rate will never have been so small” and that the maximum discount will increase “from 25% to 15%”.