In a column published in the JDDa collective proposes to generalize the collective capitalization systems in addition to the distribution, citing as an example the supplementary pension fund for pharmacists
This is the debate that arises with each new pension reform: pay-as-you-go or capitalization? While the executive’s project does not call into question the historic pay-as-you-go system, several voices are raised here and there in favor of capitalization: David Lisnard, Philippe Juvin, Jacques Garello…
In a column published this Saturday in The Sunday Journala collective of economists and entrepreneurs (including François Asselin, president of the CPME) pleads in turn for a principle of collective capitalization, taking as an example the supplementary pension fund for pharmacists, the CAVP.
Returning to past reforms, the signatories do not mince their words: “Contributions have increased, the retirement age has been raised, the methods for calculating and reassessing pensions have been tightened. This reduces the purchasing power of both active and retired people.Their fear: a drastic drop in the purchasing power of seniors in the coming decades. “According to the Pensions Orientation Council, in 2070 it will return to the level of the 1980s, with a decline in the relative purchasing power of retirees of around 20% compared to the rest of the population.“, they argue.
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For the editors of the forum, “this decline is the mechanical consequence of shaky demography and almost exclusive financing of day-to-day pensions by pay-as-you-go in the private sector.Is the pay-as-you-go system established in post-war France outdated? This is what the signatories affirm, who believe that “ limiting the funding of mandatory pensions to pay-as-you-go leads to impoverishing the mass of future private pensioners.»
For the collective, the solution already exists, it is capitalization, in addition to the distribution: “some professions have had the foresight to reinstate compulsory capitalization and note that it is a success”. Two schemes are mentioned: that of civil servants, automatically affiliated since 2005 to the additional public service pension (RAFP) and that, less known, of pharmacists. Via the Pharmacists’ Old Age Insurance Fund, part of the profession’s supplementary pension is in fact based on collective capitalization.
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The authors call forgeneralize these collective capitalization schemes in addition to the distribution“. By what means? That of the social partners, who have co-managed French supplementary pensions since 1947. “Agirc-Arrco has real legitimacy. It could create an equivalent of the RAFP, which would work for the benefit of all private sector employees“, suggests the platform.
Beneficial for the purchasing power of retirees, the measure would also be a support for growth, according to the signatories, who see it as a vector of “financing of businesses and projects of the future».