Act I: the urgent need to stem the fourth wave of the pandemic in the short term. Act II: in the medium and long term, sustainably relaunch a damaged country. To do this, Emmanuel Macron announced this Monday evening a new investment plan for the start of the school year, aimed at “building the France of 2030”.
The Head of State wished to first draw up a picture of the current economic situation. With a satisfaction: “The “Whatever the cost”, to which I made a commitment in March 2020, enabled us to protect our companies, our jobs ”, but also of “to preserve the purchasing power of many French people and is at the origin of a vigorous rebound” economic, estimated the head of state.
The executive is now counting on growth of 6% by 2021, which would place France “at the head of the major European economies”. Forecasts had so far been 5%, but they were revised upwards last week by Insee and the European Commission.
“Employment, a priority for this summer”
Figures that give hope for the end of partial activity measures. “The priority for summer and autumn is to not only regain the level of employment before the epidemic, but also to put us back on a path of full employment”, he estimated.
The head of state said that the job had “resisted” during the pandemic, highlighting the creation of 187,000 jobs in May, even if 300,000 jobs have been destroyed since the start of the year. In May, “we have achieved an unprecedented number of permanent contracts created, equaling our 2006 record in all sectors which, such as culture, hospitality, catering, sport, tourism, have suffered the most”, where the support plans “made it possible to prevent human tragedies, bankruptcies and to envisage a peaceful recovery”.
Digital, ecology, biotechnologies …
–
But the President of the Republic also wanted to draw a perspective on a more distant horizon. To consolidate the new start of the economy after the sledgehammer struck the economy by more than a year of health crisis, he said floor on “an investment plan which will aim for one objective: to build the France of 2030 and to bring out in our country and in Europe the champions of tomorrow who, in the fields of digital technology, green industry, biotechnologies or even in the agriculture, will shape our future “.
Emmanuel Macron had already mentioned at the end of April “a second step in the revival”, while 40 billion euros of the first plan have so far been mobilized out of the total envelope of 100 billion.
Retreats on the back-to-school menu
Last point addressed by Emmanuel Macron: the highly contested pension reform will be initiated “as soon as the sanitary conditions are met”, he said, asking the government to “work with the social partners on this subject at the start of the school year”.
He reaffirmed that he was “fair and effective change in our pension system” in order to “protect current pensions and those of our children”, qualifying the current system of“unfair”: “With 42 different regimes, it maintains major inequalities.”
–
