Changes in the French social

protection system

Towards a Welfare security ?

Michel MessuNantes University and GEPECS Paris-

Descartes (France)

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The French social protection system: structure

Social insurance

Statutory

Contribution-based

Covers risks

Compensates for a loss

Eligibility controls

Social welfare

Linked to residency

Non-contributive

Relief for survival

Limited amounts

Controls of eligibility and

use of benefits

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Institutional building and consolidation in 1945

Social insurance

Social insurance fund • Health insurance fund

(CNAMTS)

• Occupational health and safety and employment injury (CNAMTS)

• Old age fund (CNAVTS)

• Family benefits fund (CNAF)

Social welfare

Social welfare services• State-centralised (medical

aid, child protection, etc.)

• Local relief by town authorities and local administration + private charities

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Towards universalisation of compulsory social insurance: some landmarks

1945 Wage-workers in industry and trade

1947 Civil servants - Pensions for private sector executives and managers

1948 Pensions for self-employed workers outside agriculture (professionals, crasftsmen, shopkeepers,

retailers, etc.)

1952 Pensions for farmers

1961 Health insurance for farmers

1966 Health insurance for self-employed workers outside agriculture

1975 Universalisation of old-age insurance legal coverage to the labour force

1990 Establishment of a social security income tax (CSG)

1999 Universalisation of health insurance legal coverage (partly tax- based for non contributors)

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Changes in social welfare services and schemes

Since the 1970’s and 1980’s, assistance and relief benefits distributed to the poor, the disabled, widows, etc. tend to be turned into minimum income benefits.

The minimum income benefits represent a hybridisation between social insurance and social welfare. They target 8 different categories of situations. They are financed by the general budget.

One of the most significant minimum income benefits was established in 1988. In the midst of a dramatic rise of unemployment, the State created a minimum income aimed at social and employment integration (RMI). It is served to unemployed and non active persons above 25 years old.

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Welfare security or towards a fiscal-based welfare insurance

Universalisation is reached through a combination of contributive social insurance and fiscal-based minimum income benefits. For example, universal health insurance provides the same protection to « the non-working poor » and contributing workers.

The new schemes provide an income guarantee on a relatively long-term basis.

A growing hybridisation of protection schemes addressing groups and individuals that had previously been separated according to their employment and labour force status.

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Overcoming the threshold effect and the employment status dividing line: an

example with the RSA

Since 2009, the Active solidarity income (RSA) replaces the RMI:

• It provides benefits to poor unemployed persons, to poor non-labour force members but also to working poor.

• It allows the beneficiaries to combine welfare benefits and labour income.

• It smoothens the threshold effect of the previous minimum income RMI when an unemployed person finds a low income job.

• It is coupled with active labour market integration measures and controls

• It is funded by the general budget However:

• It only covers a small share of the under 25 years old, at very restrictive conditions

• It does not redress the tilt of labour integration and training schemes

• It institutionalises the fact that labour income is not the sole source of revenue for workers (issue of minimum wage, of workers on welfare, etc.)

• It is mainly funded through middle-class solidarity (income tax structure)

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Towards universalisation of effective social rights ?

A general trend to criticise and overcome:

• Pernicious effects of targeted and conditional assistance benefits

• Administrative costs of entry into the schemes and of various controls (eligibility, behaviour and benefit uses)

• Persistent non take-up• Stigmatisation and social fragmentation

But universalisation remains hindered by :

• Restrictive conditions and multiple requirements to enter minimum income schemes

• Only concerns certain social groups according to age, residency, legal status, family income

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Some pending political and technical issues

Which social units are the schemes addressing? • The family, or household? The individual?

What is the status of the beneficiary ?• A citizen ? A poor, a disabled, a child, a mother, an old person ?

Which type of right ?• Conditional vs. unconditional ? Compensatory vs. preventive?

Which provider ?• Public administration, firms and market, civil society organisations?

Which funding sources and combination ?

Equality, equity or fragmented and unequal universalisation ?

It does not solve the problem of real poverty because the benefits are too low.

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Conclusion

The major transformations of the French social protection system :

Tend to hybridise and to blur the insurance / assistance - welfare divide

Provide basic income benefits that protect human

dignity

Maintain restrictive entry and eligibility conditions

Tend to reinforce behavioural controls and checks

on benefit uses.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION

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