Retirees are increasingly contributing to the financing of social protection, of which they are the primary beneficiaries. This is what emerges from a note just published by France Stratégie, the former Planning Commission.
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Retired people make it possible to contain the increase in the contribution of working people. It should be noted that expenses related to illness, pensions and the loss of autonomy of over 60s now represent three quarters of social protection expenditure. These expenditures have increased significantly over the past forty to fifty years, going from 15% of GDP at the end of the 1970s to 30% at the end of the 2000s. It is first and foremost a demographic question. This category of the population is increasingly important and therefore contributes more in volume. Then there are the pension reforms with the lowering of the effective retirement age and the method of calculating pensions.
Finally, the change can be explained by the diversification of sources of pension funding: there was a relatively large drop in social contributions weighing on the working population, gradually offset by the Generalized Social Contribution (CSG) which also weighed on employees. the elderly. The latter contributed more, which made it possible to limit the increase in the contribution of working people to the financing of social protection.
Nonetheless, people of working age continue to provide most of the financing of social protection. And this is normal, in the name of intergenerational solidarity specific to our system: on average, people aged 40 to 59 contribute annually to the tune of 19,400 euros compared to 7,900 euros for those aged 60-79 and 5 100 euros for over 80s.