While Emmanuel Macron had estimated that the effort for the military reset of France would not be made via tax, the leader of the CFDT Marylise Léon believes that this “would not be possible” without increase.
The union official estimated this Monday morning on RTL on Monday morning that the people “will help to make efforts but everyone must make efforts”, faced with “an attacker who is Russia today”. Excluding to enter a debate which would oppose the defense and the French social model, “we are not going to choose between the cannon and the allowances,” she said, deeming this formula “terrifying”.
In a television warning last week against the “dangers” aroused by the rapprochement between Moscow and Washington, the President of the Republic Emmanuel Macron suggested that a new difficult budgetary effort awaited the French, with “reforms, choices, courage”, to finance the rearmament of France.
“Without tax increases, it will not be possible,” said Marylise Léon. “The cement of social cohesion is the tax and therefore it must be not” that contributes “but” which can contribute “and” who has the means to do so “,” she added, judging that “this question of tax could also be” temporary “.
No drop in social benefits
On the other hand, she specified that a drop in social benefits in order to identify the funds necessary for the rearmament “may be extremely complicated”. The union official believes that, for her power plant, “you have to put everything on the table” as part of the public finance conference that she calls for her wishes. “We had already asked for the 2025 budget, we must be able to have around the table all the stakeholders to mention these economic issues, these budgetary questions,” she added.
The fact remains that with degraded public finances and compulsory levies already are among the highest in the world, the increase in taxes is likely to wedge. The government has indicated to think about different solutions. Hypotheses are advanced as a national loan, a practice widely used in the last century to finance economic recovery policies. François Bayrou also issued the track of a dedicated savings book, to increase military spending without aggravating the public deficit. “Popular and voluntary savings is one of the interesting ideas to dig and we discuss it with Éric Lombard, the Minister of Economy and Finance,” assured the Minister of Armed Forces, Sébastien Lecornu.