Here’s What To Know About France’s Controversial Pension Reforms As Macron Survives No-Confidence Vote

Topline

France’s controversial pension reform proposal will become law, raising the country’s retirement age by two years, after President Emmanuel Macron’s government narrowly survived a no-confidence vote Monday—the culmination of months of intense protests and strikes that have gripped the country.

French President Emmanuel Macron narrowly survived a no-confidence vote Monday. (Photo by LUDOVIC … [+] MARIN/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

POOL/AFP via Getty Images

Key Facts

Macron unveiled a plan in January to gradually raise France’s legal age of retirement from 62 to 64 by 2030 in an effort to cut pension costs, and require people to work for 43 years—up from 42 right now—to receive a full pension, which averages about 1,400 euros per month after taxes.

As France’s population ages, Macron says the pension system will run a deficit in the coming years (the body that monitors France’s pension system has projected a deficit for the next decade, but denied the system faces an urgent threat of bankruptcy and admitted long-term deficits are difficult to predict).

Macron proposed raising the retirement age in his successful 2022 re-election campaign, though opinion polls conducted before the election showed a significant majority opposed this plan.

The proposal faced immediate resistance from labor unions, some of which issued a joint statement in January promising strikes, denying the pension system is in danger and stating “nothing justifies such a brutal reform.”

The Senate, the upper house of France’s parliament, approved Macron’s plan last week—but he forced the measure through the National Assembly, the lower house, to circumvent a full vote due to lack of support, as his centrist Renaissance party lost its outright majority last year.

Macron’s plan has faced resistance from across the political spectrum, including from Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally party and Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s far-left La France Insoumise, and many lawmakers booed and shouted “resignation” when the government announced the measure would be forced through the National Assembly.

Macron invoked Article 49.3 of the French Constitution, which allows the government to pass a bill without a National Assembly vote—but crucially, this allows lawmakers to file a no-confidence vote against the government within 24 hours.

News Peg

Macron’s government survived a no-confidence vote in the National Assembly on Monday, meaning his pension plan will become law. Some 278 lawmakers voted in favor of the motion, nine votes short of the required 287 to pass. Had the motion passed, Prime Minister Élisabeth Borne and her cabinet would have had to resign, but Macron would have remained president. Charles de Courson, the author of the no-confidence vote, said removing the government would be “the only way of stopping the social and political crisis in this country.”

Crucial Quote

“We have a president who makes use of a permanent coup d’état,” French Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure said after Macron forced his plan through the National Assembly without a vote.

Contra

“We’re not reforming pensions to be popular but to be responsible. We’ll go all the way because it’s the only way our social model can survive,” French government spokesperson Olivier Veran said.

Key Background

Though controversial, Macron’s plan was not unexpected: Talks of pension reform have persisted in France, which has one of the world’s lowest retirement ages and highest spending on pensions, for decades. Macron’s finance minister has said raising the retirement age would prevent the government from pursuing other potentially unpopular measures like lowering pension payments or raising taxes. A September 2022 report by France’s Pensions Advisory Council found on average, the pension system will run a deficit over the next quarter century, projecting the system’s finances will deteriorate between 2023 and 2027, though it also projected a return to breakeven by the mid-2030s even without reforms. But previous calls for reform have faced staunch opposition, as people push back against changing a system that has led France to have one of Europe’s lowest rates of poverty risk for pensioners. During Macron’s first term, pension reform plans sparked massive protests in 2019. The transportation strikes, which spilled over into 2020, became the longest in the country’s history, though plans to overhaul the pension system were delayed because of the pandemic. Protesters have previously succeeded in pushing the government to abandon pension reforms: In 1995, when then-President Jacques Chirac planned to increase the retirement age for some civil servants, the government ditched reform efforts after millions protested for weeks straight in the largest protests the country had seen in decades.

Chief Critic

Macron’s proposal sparked fierce, months-long protests spearheaded by the country’s labor unions, as well as strikes by teachers, transit workers, students, garbage collectors and oil refinery workers. The estimated number of protesters, who view Macron’s plan as an unnecessary burden on blue-collar workers and an affront to their right to retirement, has topped one million for several demonstrations held between January and March. Protests in early March, in which the country’s largest labor union CGT urged workers to “bring France to a halt,” topped 1.28 million protesters per police estimates and left many without transportation or electricity as garbage piled up in the streets. Hundreds have been detained at protests across the country, and French police have banned gatherings in certain public places in an effort to subdue the unrest.