For a long time, the subject of retirement has been questioning me, not that I am particularly in a hurry to get there, but it is a moment in life that calls out to me. As a student of population geography, a good thirty years ago, I produced a dossier on this theme since it is inexorably linked to the fall in the birth rate and the lengthening of life expectancy, two very studied subjects in demography.
But we already knew that the problem of financing today's pensions was going to arise. We could very clearly anticipate and go further in the reasoning to calmly consider the retirement of future generations. But we are almost at the same point as at the beginning of the 1990s, in particular because of the difficulty we have in questioning our choice of almost exclusive distribution, and the egalitarianism which constantly pushes us, a little slyly, moreover, towards more special diets.
This paradoxically increases the feeling that we are not all in the same boat, and that some are clearly more privileged than others. So it's time to take an interest in the real question of our end of career, apart from the financing that I don't control, and which, in any case, will find a solution in the sketch that I want to present to you.
Fulfillment at work
Our society attaches great importance to the professional situation, and many people make their career their main objective in life. Without going that far, we can agree that fulfillment at work is a factor of personal well-being, and that the social relationships we maintain are very clearly oriented towards our professional relationships. Thus, retirement is often experienced as a sidelining and a loss of usefulness, even a significant isolation and harmful to the balance of the newly retired person.
Yet we continue to "retire" people who would continue a bit, but not at the same pace. Armed with their experience and their know-how, they could help, train, direct… in short, continue to feel useful without exhausting themselves and putting their health at risk. Because reaching retirement so as not to enjoy it a little is not the objective either.
My personal questioning is not so much to know at what age I will be able to retire as to consider under what conditions I will get there. Thus, leaving at 62, as is the case now, or at 64, or even 65 as is foreseeable, is not the major subject, except of course in terms of balancing the accounts. So let's leave later, but let's leave better. Because in the same position as today at 65 in the same conditions, that would not be desirable, neither for me nor for the others: teachers, parents and even students. This question is surely valid in many sectors and for many positions.
@mollyellis1402 Good luck for the future Molly. You are going to be an excellent staff nurse! What an exciting day… https://t.co/oZjx6g40iJ
— Stephen Searby Sat Tue 27 07:08:03 +0000 2021
Hardship and ignorance of the work of others
Each job presents its sources of arduousness, and I do not wish to judge the “easy” or “painful” nature of professions other than mine. On the other hand, I know that I will not be as effective in my work after a certain age. I'm 51, and I'm already telling myself that in a few years from now I won't be able to consider my position in the same way as today. While on the outside many seem to imagine it as “not arduous”, the job of headteacher is very stressful. I run all day, doing several things simultaneously, responding to multiple requests without almost any respite from morning to evening. I'm sure the same is true for many professions. So let's not oppose the different sectors, but rather agree that it depends on each of us.
Most of the time, we take the examples of the roofer and the office worker to compare hardship at work. However, this varies in these two professions depending on the particular conditions in the company concerned and the physical situation of the employees. It is obvious that health is an important parameter that we only very partially control. So let's not assume the professional conditions of our neighbours, whom we know very little about. This only leads to conflict and reproaches on both sides, which prevent dialogue and invalidate any consensus. The only global approach is to say that hardship is what people feel and experience on a daily basis in their professional tasks depending on their state of health at the time. We all have examples of loved ones (or ourselves), suffering from long-term illnesses who have gone through a complicated period, thus making professional activity much more difficult than usual.
On the end of special diets and choice at the end of a career
Also, let's try to plan a retirement based on the same principles for everyone, but leaving a good deal of choice to everyone. The end of the special regimes is necessary to stop pitting the French against each other, by seeking the best off, and by putting them in the position of profiteers in relation to the others who would inevitably be further exploited by society. So the same plan for everyone, but with possibilities offered to everyone to adjust the last years. For example, giving future retirees the option of significantly reducing their working hours to maintain efficiency and significant well-being without "dipping" into their health capital. Obviously the salary would depend on the duration, but at least people would have the choice, which we can consider around 58-60 years old.
Similarly, we can imagine proposals for professional development from a certain age, around 55-60 depending on the branches and professions, where positions would be marked and reserved for the employees concerned. Of course, contributions and pensions would be calculated based on all of these choices. But at least, the employee would be an actor in his own retirement and would not experience it either as an exclusion from society or as a distant prospect, because he is physically diminished and hardly waits to reach the required age for this.
Personally, I know that the working conditions are very diverse according to the regions and the different geographical sectors where the schools are located, but it is obvious that at the end of their careers the directors would be more efficient by supervising the new ones, by training, or by working two halves for a single position, which is impossible today.
Respect for the State's commitment and public speech
We must calmly and together plan solutions for each position that are both suitable for employees and financially sustainable for pension accounts. Anyway, with an identical calculation for all, let's start from 64 years and the 20 best years for example, if the last are not part of it, it will be the choice of each of us. Of course, this somewhat idealized system will not be possible in each job, for all employees or other positions, depending on the branches of activity and the financial conditions of each. But it is really desirable to put people at the heart of the decisions that affect them in order to restore meaning to the word responsibility. Everyone, in one way or another that we have yet to invent, would be invited to choose between different options for their last professional years, and would gain in well-being, if only by being an actor, responsible of part of its future.
Public speech must once again be credible. It is therefore necessary to stop constantly changing the rules and then go back to the previous modifications, and in the end not having sufficiently taken into account the specificity of each one for a correct solution for all. The probable situation at the end of my career and the contract I signed at the start of my first-level teaching duties are not at all similar. There are positive changes and other negative ones, I am not criticizing that, but simply wish to expose that the successive modifications render inaudible the speech of the State. The choice of a profession can also be made because of end-of-career conditions, which if they change, completely call into question the initial decision. This is very true for long careers and possibilities of early departure with a full number of years of contribution.
So, after having made the changes, don't take the French for idiots anymore! May politicians finally leave us with a sense of responsibility for our own lives! We will choose consciously and with full knowledge of our possibilities in terms of health, expenses and our wishes for our old age. Sovereignty is exercised first in the individual responsibility of the choice of his life, in the respect of the common good that the people would have defined sovereignly by a referendum composed of several questions on pensions.
