The shopping center is teeming with people. On this Saturday afternoon, visitors to Les 3 Fontaines, in Cergy (Val-d’Oise), walk as much as they spend in the shops. Here, we have fun. But often with constrained budgets. So, when Emmanuel is asked if he thinks he lives better than his parents, the fifty-something stops short, in the central aisle, and raises an amused eyebrow.
“They had a second home which served as a family home,” says this RATP employee, father of three children. We clearly cannot afford it today. We live less well than before even if we earn more than our parents. But it’s not surprising: it’s been twenty years since salaries have been indexed to inflation and increases mean nothing. Wages are falling. » Next to him, his wife Magali, a nurse, considers herself well off despite everything, owner of a house in Yvelines.