In Villejuif (Val-de-Marne),
Saliha quickly passes Louis-Aragon station, terminus of metro line 7. As much to warm up as to not drag too much on the way. It is already 11:15 a.m. on this Wednesday morning, and she has to walk to the Carrefour supermarket in Villejuif, along the D7, this major artery that goes down to Rungis and Orly before flowing into the Autoroute du Soleil. “There’s Monoprix closer, but it’s become too expensive for us,” she explains, wrapped up in her hood.
On sick leave for two years, this 58-year-old woman has had no income for five months. While waiting for her file to be unblocked, she can only count on the approximately 950 euros in pension from her husband to support the household. The races will be reduced to the bare minimum. “We never fill up,” she says. We only buy the essentials, oil, potatoes, some frozen foods, sugar. But there, everything has increased and we have to be even more careful, otherwise we can’t get out of it. And too bad for the quality. Saliha knows that she “often buys products that are not very good for her health”. “No choice”, she regrets.
Soaring energy prices
Saliha is not the only one to complain about a drop in her purchasing power. In the parking lot of the shopping center, Nadia is putting away her trolley. An organized type, she compared prices, paid attention to promotions and used coupons that saved her 30 euros. “Everything has increased, it’s crazy,” breathes this mother of two children, who also goes to Lidl and the Rungis market to deflate the bill. She now has about 250 euros a week to feed the household. And on the electricity side, it got carried away. “We pay 600 euros for two months, it was 450 last year. We are at home, but well isolated and we have not increased our consumption. »
Everyone has noticed this surge, confirmed by INSEE figures: the price of energy increased by 18.6% between December 2021 and December 2020. “This is mainly due to the rise in the price of oil . After a low point in April 2020, it has risen very sharply and is affecting the price of petrol, fuel oil, gas and electricity”, explains Hervé Péléraux, economist at the OFCE (French Observatory of Economic Conditions) . Energy is thus responsible for half of the general rise in prices of 2.8% still observed in December.
An inaudible theme
Vital, the theme of purchasing power remains, however, according to Saliha, Nadia and millions of French people, absent from the debates at the start of the presidential campaign. Despite the not so distant movement of “yellow vests”. In all the opinion polls, this subject is always the first cited among those “about which we do not talk enough”. Between the Covid-19, the entry into the campaign of Eric Zemmour and the primary of LR, the debates have been going around in circles for weeks. “I have the impression that we are only talking about immigration and security”, Nadia is desperate.
The candidates have certainly sketched out ways to improve the ordinary of the population. Marine Le Pen is posing as a “candidate in purchasing power” thanks to a few key measures such as the reduction of VAT to 5.5% on fuel and energy. Jean-Luc Mélenchon promises a social emergency law which “would contain in particular the blocking of the prices of energy, fuel and food products”. Yannick Jadot and Anne Hidalgo propose an increase in the minimum wage, when Valérie Pécresse intends to “increase net wages below 2.2 Smic within five years [soit 2.800 euros] 10%, excluding inflation.
“Taboo question”
The subject, however, remains quite inaudible, including because the contenders for the Elysee Palace know it is dangerous. The two communication experts Robert Zarader and Samuel Jequier even qualify it, in a column published by The world in December, of “electoral serial killer”. And to emphasize that “the rise in wages is the taboo question that has tripped up presidential candidates since the beginning of the 2000s”.
“There is a part of the inflation over which a government can have control, observes Hervé Péléraux, with energy checks, a freeze on gas and electricity prices or a reduction in taxes. But these measures would mitigate the effects of inflation, not address the inflationary mechanics itself, which is created by the market. »
Prime Minister Jean Castex had promised in September the establishment of a “tariff shield” in order to block gas prices and limit the increase in electricity prices to 4% in February 2022. A measure confirmed on Friday by the Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire, assuring that the increase would otherwise have been 35%. A good point for the future candidate Emmanuel Macron?
Group purchases
Some did not wait for these boosts to organize themselves and try to limit the breakage. One of the means increasingly used to lower bills is to group consumers in order to better negotiate prices. The concept has been in vogue for a few years, supported by associations. Now, this is happening at the city level, with the help of specialized companies like Wikipower.
Leader in the energy sector, it was created from this initial premise: the market has been liberalized since 2007, but people are completely lost in it. “We come to meet the inhabitants, we answer their questions, then we bring together as many of them as possible and we send specifications to all the suppliers so that they can give us the best possible offer”, explains Etienne Jallet. , president of the France branch, opened in 2016.
The city of Tarare (Rhône) used its services last year. Result, “a gain in purchasing power of 150 to 160 euros per year on average for the inhabitants”, claims the leader, “plus a fixed price on gas for three years”. The perfect shot, signed by chance in March, just before prices soared. Quentin Thévenon, chief of staff to the mayor, piloted this project. Faced with this success, appreciated by citizens, he is considering extending the principle to other areas, as part of a “Purchasing Power House” opened last year.
“We expect nothing from presidential candidates”
“We want something pragmatic, which saves money and which is aimed at as many people as possible,” he describes. We are only at the beginning of the system. We see that it works, that there is demand. We do not forbid ourselves anything. A network of towns interested in this approach is being set up. Main lesson: more than the State, the municipality, even with more limited means, represents “the right level to exchange and reintroduce confidence” with a population suffocated by the cost of living, believes Quentin Thévenon.
The presidential candidates have a job to convince. “We don’t expect anything from them,” murmurs Saliha, looking weary. “If tomorrow there is someone who declares that he will work for purchasing power, for pensions, with clear and realistic measures, I will vote for this person”, slips Nadia when getting into her car. She turns around one last time: “But for the moment, I don’t see her. »