how does solidarity day work? | EUROtoday

It was after the lethal heatwave of 2003: President Chirac and his authorities considered sacrificing a public vacation to finance a National Solidarity Fund for Autonomy (CNSA). Relaxed in 2008, then prolonged to retirees, the mechanism brings in additional than 3 billion euros per yr.

1. How was at the present time of solidarity born?

2003: reacting after the heatwave

The summer season of 2003 was marked by a heatwave which precipitated the untimely demise of some 15,000 individuals, most of them aged.

Weakened by his lengthy summer season silence, weighed down by the administration thought-about disastrous by the federal government of Jean-Pierre Raffarin, Jacques Chirac tried to regain management by saying a symbolic measure: the French must work on a public vacation to finance solidarity in favor of the aged.

The authorities is first considering of May 8, earlier than deciding in favor of Pentecost Monday, which has a double benefit. First of all, it’s not a non secular vacation – solely Pentecost Sunday is. And by definition, Whit Monday by no means falls on the weekend and means that you can get hold of fixed sources.

2004: a regulation on “autonomy”

The precept of at the present time of solidarity is transcribed within the regulation of June 30, 2004:

“A day of solidarity is established to ensure the financing of actions in favor of the autonomy of elderly or disabled people. It takes the form of an additional day of unpaid work for employees and the contribution [des employeurs pour financer] the autonomy of elderly people and people with disabilities. »

The law specifies that“in the absence of a convention or agreement, the day of solidarity is Pentecost Monday”.

2008: Monday… or not

Unevenly utilized and the goal of recurring criticism, the solidarity day was reformed in 2008. Since this date, corporations have been free to decide on the day on which workers will work to finance dependency, whether or not it’s Pentecost Monday or any day of the yr – aside from Christmas Day or Good Friday in Alsace and Moselle, topic to the Concordat.

2. Who works in the present day, Pentecost Monday?

The 2008 leisure provides extra latitude to employers: some go for the elimination of a day of depart or discount of working time (RTT), others give it as a present to their workers. The basic precept stays that workers work 7 hours extra throughout the yr with out being paid. The SNCF, for instance, had determined to distribute 1 minute 52 seconds of further work per day.

According to a research by the Randstad group, carried out in 2016 amongst 25 of its short-term employment businesses, financial exercise was down 70% on Pentecost Monday that yr. Industry was virtually at a standstill, aside from sure SMEs, whereas companies, notably companies, have been working virtually usually. A state of affairs near a traditional public vacation, and a far cry from 2005, when 44% of workers labored on Pentecost Monday.

The CFTC union, which deplores these disparities between workers (and much more so with the liberal professions, who aren’t topic to the solidarity contribution), denounces the precept of working without cost. Believing that the trouble is unfairly distributed, he recordsdata a strike name every year to “cover” any personal sector worker who decides to not work at Pentecost.

3. How does at the present time make cash?

For his work, a worker receives a wage. The additional day – whether or not it’s Whit Monday or some other day – just isn’t paid additional. Which implies that the employer wins since, for a similar wage, his worker works extra.

In return for this “gain”, theemployer should pay 0.3% of their payroll to the National Solidarity Fund for Autonomy. This counterpart is known as the autonomy solidarity contribution (CSA). Capital earnings, excluding well-liked financial savings similar to Livret A, can be topic to this 0.3% levy.

Since 1^er April 2013, the retired and disabled topic to earnings tax should additionally contribute 0.3% of their pensions to financing dependency by paying the extra financial solidarity contribution (CASA). A windfall supposed to finance the regulation of“adaptation of society to aging” entry into pressure on 1^er January 2016.

4. How a lot does the solidarity day usher in?

According to the CNSA, the solidarity day was anticipated to usher in greater than 3 billion euros for the yr 2017: 2.367 billion euros financed by worker contributions (CSA) and 749 million paid by retirees (CASA). Since its implementation in 2004, the overall quantity paid for the autonomy of aged and dependent individuals exceeds 36 billion euros.

5. How is the cash used?

In 2017, the National Solidarity Fund should redistribute the solidarity contribution paid by workers for the advantage of the aged (60% of the quantity) and the disabled (40%). The majority will finance specialised institutions (retirement properties, institutes for the disabled) and the opposite will probably be paid to the departments which handle the customized autonomy allowance, the incapacity compensation profit and the departmental properties for disabled individuals.

On the opposite hand, the extra contribution, levied on pensions and pensions, just isn’t solely used for concrete actions: actually, it was created in 2013 when the regulation on autonomy had not been handed, and a big a part of the 700 million euros collected every year has due to this fact not been used till now. In 2017, 10% of the quantity remained excellent (in comparison with 37% in 2016).

A report from the General Inspectorate of Social Affairs talked about in 2010 a sum of 1.8 billion euros in unused surpluses. “We are deceiving employees and retirees, who are being asked to pay money for the elderly and disabled”denounced in 2010 Mr. Champvert, director of the Association of Directors Serving the Elderly (AD-PA).

On the facet of the National Solidarity Fund, we clarify that solely ” a small part ” under-consumed credit have been reallocated to Health Insurance (which is certainly one of its primary contributors). In 2014, to compensate for the “pot” created by CASA, the State additionally lowered a part of what it pays beneath the CSG: it’s due to this fact an oblique method of diverting cash from the fund in the direction of state funds.

The CNSA laid out in 2016 that unused credit represent “reserves” for the physique “which can be reallocated in subsequent years to expenses related to [à son] field of intervention » and that the sums taken from the salaries and pensions of the French should be “fully assigned to the CNSA”.