Europe 1 with AFP // Credits: JOEL SAGET / AFP 6:38 a.m., February 29, 2024
The pension reform increases the pension amount of the most modest by a maximum of 100 euros.
In 2024, the reform of the minimum contribution will increase the pension of 185,000 new retirees out of a total of nearly 634,000 individuals.
Note that the Drees does not take into account people who are already retired, they are also affected by the increase in Mico.
The boost to small pensions provided for by the pension reform will benefit 185,000 new retirees in 2024, for an average increase of around 30 euros per month, according to a study by the statistical service of the Ministry of Labor, Health and Welfare. solidarity (Drees).
The study evaluates the gain linked to the reform for the flow of new retirees in 2024 and thereafter.
It does not address the case of the 1.7 million people already retired at the time of the entry into force of the reform, on September 1, 2023, who will also benefit from a revaluation as part of this boost. to small pensions.
The estimate by the Drees of an average increase of 30 euros for new retirees confirms the assessment that the National Old Age Insurance Fund (CNAV) had already made before the Senate last October.
But the CNAV did not then specify the number of people concerned.
The highly contested pension reform has revalued the "contributory minimum" (Mico), a support system for small pensions, so that they reach at least 85% of the net minimum wage (1,200 euros at the time of the reform), for an employee having completed a full career at minimum wage.
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Strengthen the social aspect
The government introduced this measure to strengthen the social aspect of a reform raising the legal retirement age to 64 years, compared to 62 years previously.
But the executive and the majority were accused of having oversold the positive effect of the measure on the level of small pensions, by pretending a much more advantageous development than it really was.
For the Drees, the "revaluation of small pensions" effect of the pension reform will in any case continue in the years and decades to come, since the "Mico" is now indexed to the minimum wage, and not to the inflation.
The proportion of new retirees benefiting from support for small pensions will thus remain well above what it would have been without the reform: almost 30% in 2024, with a drop to 25% in the following decade, and a slight rise in the following decades.
According to Drees, the reform also has a redistributive effect.
“It is for the most modest beneficiaries that the minimum contribution has the greatest effects,” she emphasizes.
The Drees also indicates that “women benefit from the minimum contribution twice as often as men”.
“Thanks to the contributory minimum, the average pension gap in basic private sector schemes between women and men is reduced, from 16.6% to 14.5%,” she indicates.
Concerning the 1.7 million people already retired at the time the reform came into force, the CNAV estimated the gain brought by the reform at 60 euros on average.