A recovery plan of 100 billion euros promised by Jean Castex

A recovery to 100 billion euros: this is what Prime Minister Jean Castex promised in his general policy speech. Behind this figure, what can we say about its economic strategy?

First, one thing that has not been noted: this is the first general policy speech in which a French Prime Minister is counting on European money to finance his ambitions. Part of the 100 billion in the stimulus plan, 40 billion precisely, will indeed come directly from funds borrowed by the European Union and transferred to France. It is good to realize this: it means that solidarity within Europe works. Without this, and in this case without a Franco-German agreement to achieve it, our country would not have been able to commit such considerable sums to recover from the crisis that we are undergoing. We will benefit from a form of "Marshall Plan" internal to Europe.

And the industry must be one of the main beneficiaries.

Yes, coincidence or not, 40 billion will be spent on strengthening the competitiveness of our productive system, our industry. In this envelope, there are both tax cuts, six billion to alleviate the famous production taxes that lead the "made in France", and a whole series of sectoral measures that were already in the pipeline for the automotive, tourism, aeronautics etc. Finally, the industry will also benefit from the benefits of the 20 billion spent on the energy transition and the thermal renovation of buildings. Clearly, to speak of economic strategy, several tens of billions of euros are intended to improve the French offer to avoid the risk of dropping out.

At the same time, it feels like you're lining up the billions without counting.

It is clear, the valves are wide open. We had fun counting: the words "deficit" and "expenditure" were pronounced once each yesterday by Jean Castex against three times and 17 times respectively by Edouard Philippe in his own general policy speech. We can clearly see that we have changed paradigm. Jean Castex's economic strategy is based on massive recovery, social measures and strong state intervention in the economy. It is even a question of reviving the plan, that is to say. We talk about relocation, investment in sectors of the future, there is pompidolism in this approach. But little time to get there: 600 days is not much to change the face of the French economy, since this is the ambition displayed.