LETTER TO THE PRIME MINISTER OF FRANCE

January 23. 2025

To Mr. Prime Minister of France,

Dear Sir,

I was an economist; a long-time member of the Socialist Party and I have now been retired for several years. I would like to respectfully express my shock at the incessant attacks by the media, particularly by supposedly specialized journalists, "against retirees". This gives the impression of a savage era in which vulnerable and elderly people become the prey of other people without moral principles and often privileged; they refuse to face the problems, probably because of a frozen conservatism. I fear that many retirees will react to these attacks by changing their vote to an extremist party that claims, "without having the competence", to guarantee their standard of living. It would be catastrophic if such a party were to become master of both the executive and parliament in the near future. The pension system probably needs to be changed for the new generations but certainly not for current retirees who left their jobs under a system that guarantees the last part of their lives according to contractual conditions.

Furthermore, the problem of future pensions, like that of employees, is posed in outdated terms that set aside the increasing robotization that affects blue-collar workers and the intense development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) that will put a large number of white-collar workers out of the job market. The production and creation of wealth no longer depend on demographics but on the ability of our companies to integrate robotization augmented by AI and AI to produce more and cheaper. This will allow us to develop their sales on the domestic and international market while reducing our imports.

These new techniques and processes are the product of human creation and the resulting wealth should, within the framework of a united Republic, be fairly shared between citizens who will be less and less necessary to the economy. This new era brings new economic criteria. The wealth resulting from these processes could be a very substantial source of future funding for pensions, salaries and benefits in the face of the drop in the number of employees needed by companies. This rejection of employees outside of companies has already been widely illustrated by that of seniors.

The main challenge is therefore not that of retirees but that of companies, namely to integrate these new processes (robotization augmented by AI and AI) to lower the cost of production and increase sales "while also learning to sell better". The management of our large companies must have the intellectual capacity to integrate these new production processes "in a spirit of solidarity with all citizens".

This lower need for the number of employees is a fact that the ministries of finance and national education should integrate, because it should not be seen as a catastrophe but positively as the result of progress. The United States are the great leaders in AI but lack the spirit of solidarity to share this progress with the greatest number and this for the benefit of oligarchies.

Thank you for your consideration on that matter.

Yours faithfully,

Didier BERTIN

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