Paris (AFP)

Far from the return to equilibrium announced a year ago, the social security deficit worsened this year, forcing the government, which will present its budget for 2020, postpone the recovery of accounts after the end of the five-year period. .

The relapse is severe: instead of the slight surplus announced just a year ago, the deficit of the Sécu will reach 5.4 billion euros this year and 5.1 billion next year, according to the figures almost definitive. government, of which AFP is aware.

The return to balance of the accounts of the general scheme and the old age solidarity fund (FSV), expected since 2001, is now returned to 2023.

This heavy degradation results from the choices of the executive, whose economic forecasts proved too optimistic, and which also makes pay to the Sécu the bill of "yellow vests".

In fact, the 2019 budget was barely voted that it was already obsolete. The "emergency measures" adopted in December to respond to this sling (reduced CSG for some retirees, exemption from overtime) immediately put a sword of Damocles on the stated objective.

Unexpected expenses, while resources dried up: growth, inflation and wage bill did not increase as much as hoped, reducing proportionally the expected revenues.

To complete the picture, old-age benefits were "more dynamic than expected", according to the Ministries of Public Accounts and Health, which are the link with the end of raising the legal age decided under the presidency of Nicolas Sarkozy : the effects on the actual starting age are decreasing, generating less savings.

Retirement insurance, which will eventually bear the bulk of the costly concessions to "yellow vests", will post the largest deficit (FSV included) of the four branches of the Sécu (with illness, family and accidents at work) .

An ominous result, while the executive has launched a new phase of consultation on pension reform wanted by Emmanuel Macron, aiming for a return to the equilibrium of the pension system by 2025.

- Few margins -

The head of state did not ease the task by announcing that from 2020, pensions "under 2,000 euros" would be adjusted to the level of inflation and the minimum guaranteed for a full career would be fixed at 1,000 euros per month.

Two promises of which "the total cost is estimated at 1.5 billion euros and deteriorate all the balance of the Social Security," warned in June the Social Security Accounts Committee.

It will be necessary to add to the slate a few tens of millions of euros for emblematic measures such as the recovery of maintenance by family allowance funds (CAF) or the creation of a compensated leave for caregivers of a family. elderly, sick or disabled.

An accumulation that leaves little room for maneuver for other extensions, particularly in the health sector, where hotbeds of tension are increasing: Ehpad, psychiatry, emergencies ... Each time, the Minister of Health, Agnès Buzyn, tried to defuse conflicts with plans spread over several years.

But in a constrained framework, because the increase in health insurance expenses will remain limited to 2.3%, well below a spontaneous increase of about 4.5%.

Commitments made here or there will therefore result in restrictions elsewhere. Systematically used, the pharmaceutical industry took the lead on Thursday by calling for a "moratorium" on drug price cuts.

Forced to make dissatisfaction, the government has been careful not to advance its savings, except for a coup de plan to 400 million euros on a social niche, the specific lump-sum deduction, which reduces employer contributions in construction, aviation or the media.

The account will not be there, however, even with partial disbursement of homeopathy and scheduled increases in tobacco prices. To give some air, some MPs of the majority want to extend the repayment of the debt - the "hole of the Sécu" - beyond the deadline programmed in 2024.

© 2019 AFP