2023-11-10 06:36:07
While the Senate sees in the 2024 Finance Law “the era of extreme deficits”, it also points to the cost of civil servants’ pensions. The deficit of their pension plan increases sharply in 2024 to reach 2.5 billion. The reason is simple: the very low salary increase of civil servants. The Senate, traditionally hostile to revaluations and which has just adopted the reduction in the number of civil servants, is caught in its trap.
2 billion deficit in 2024
“Expenditures of the state civil service pension plan will once again experience dynamic growth in 2024, estimated at 3.2 billion euros.“, notes centrist senator Sylvie Vermeillet, rapporteur for the “social retirement plans” mission for the Senate.
The reason is simple: the revaluation of pensions decided by the government to the tune of 5.3% in 2024 increases much faster than that of salaries with an increase in the index point of only 1.8% in 2024.
“Under these conditions, and despite the parametric reform of 2023… the balance of the pension plan for state civil servants is not assured“, deplores S Vermeillet. According to its report, the annual deficit of the state civil service pension plan will cost 2.5 billion in 2024, 3.7 in 2025 and 4.6 in 2026. In this deficit, National Education personnel are at the forefront, since this The ministry alone accounts for half of the state civil servants. The cost of pensions for National Education staff represents 22 billion.
The pension reform has not solved anything
For S Vermeillet, the reform of pension plans decided in 2023 has not resolved anything despite the increase in the retirement age. Certainly the outgoing flows should decrease by 10% in 2024. This will represent 182 million savings in 2024, or 0.35% of expenses.
But the reform also introduced perverse effects. “In the long term, the effect of the reform on the revaluation of average pensions results in an overall effect of increasing the cost of the system’s expenses from 2045 and this additional cost is estimated at 544 million euros per year in 2050. This additional cost is linked to the fact that in the long term, the average amount of pensions to be paid will be increased by the extension of the retirement age, with public officials benefiting from more favorable treatment at the time of their departure when this departure occurs later“. Thus in 2050 the reform will result in an additional cost of 508 million, very far from the expected deficit. In 2035, the reform should enable savings of 1.2 billion, but this will represent less than half of the expected deficit. “Consequently, the special rapporteur underlines that the parametric reform of 2023 will in no case make it possible to balance on its own the state civil service system, the deficit of which is expected to worsen in 2024“.
The Senate trapped in the payroll blockade
It is interesting to note that the rapporteur points to the fact that pensions are increasing more quickly than civil service salaries. Because the senatorial majority has been denouncing for years the increase in the salaries of state agents. To the point of asking for the blocking of the payroll of public agents. More recently, the Senate has amended the public finance programming law 2023-2027 to include a 5% reduction in the number of civil servants. Enough to make the pension system deficit take another leap…
Francois Jarraud
1699730334
#Senate #highlights #cost #civil #servants