A recent opinion poll realised for IREF by the Ifop institute shows that 82% of French people want to have their own individual retirement account. This percentage is even higher (87%) for the group of interviewees 35 years old or younger and for women (84%). Regardless of their political convictions, incomes and education level, the majority of the interviewees have answered that they would prefer to have pension plans rather than to rely exclusively on the “pay-as-you go” system.
Even those who have voted for the extremely left Olivier Besancenot do not trust anymore the present French pensions system.
This is important in the context of pensions’ reform proposed by the government. The so called reform is trying to avoid by any means the introduction of capitalization in France. Nevertheless, the government has to face the facts – neither the extension of the retirement age, nor the decrease of pensions will save the “pay-as-you-go” system (see Jacques Garello and George Lane’s book on pensions). The only sustainable solution for France is capitalisation, and not surprisingly, the average people are aware of this. Only the Government is not.
