During his general policy speech to the National Assembly on January 30, 2024, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal announced the abolition of the specific solidarity allowance (ASS) for unemployed people at the end of their rights.
By switching the unemployed to the end of their rights to Active Solidarity Income (RSA), the Prime Minister intends “fight inactivity traps” . What will change with this measure?
What is SSA?
Created in 1984, the specific solidarity allowance (ASS) is managed by France Travail (formerly Pôle emploi) and financed by the State. It is intended for job seekers who have exhausted their unemployment insurance rights. Thus a job seeker over 50 can choose the allowance rather than unemployment compensation if it is more favorable to him.
To receive it, the job seeker must be actively looking for work, have five years of salaried activity in the 10 years preceding the end of the employment contract and not exceed a monthly resource ceiling, reports Point.
The amount of the allowance is 18.17 euros per day (545.10 per month).
Who is concerned ?
At the end of 2021, 321,900 beneficiaries were receiving ASS, according to a document published in September 2023 by the statistical service of social ministries (Drees).
The RSA concerned 2.1 million people at the end of 2022, according to the same source. More than one in two recipients (57%) is aged 50 or over, a proportion which can be explained by the conditions of access to ASS, according to data from the end of 2019. This would mainly be about men (55%). And two out of three beneficiaries (65%) are single people.
ASS is granted to people who have exhausted their unemployment insurance rights. Their monthly resources must not exceed the net ceiling set on April 1, 2023 at €1,271.90 for a single person or €1,998.70 for a married, civil partnership or cohabiting couple.
What is the difference with the RSA?
Unlike those of the RSA, ASS beneficiaries continue to acquire quarters for the calculation of their retirement. According to Gabriel Attal, ‘ASS “extends unemployment compensation” And “allows, without working, to validate quarters” while “we consider that retirement must be the fruit of work”.
For the president of the CFE-CGC executives union, François Hommeril, the government “little by little take away the provisions that exist and allow people who are in a momentary precarious situation in their career to still acquire retirement rights”.
He adds : “You will be able to survive, but the good thing is that when you retire, you will be even poorer.”reports Point.
Furthermore, the monthly resource ceiling to benefit from ASS is more than twice that to be a recipient of RSA (911.63 euros for a couple).