Retirement age finally raised to 66.5 years? "The current reform is not sustainable"

Did you like retiring at 64? You'll love retiring at 66. The Pensions Advisory Council ( COR ) predicts a pension deficit of 1.4% of GDP by 2070 and recommends raising the retirement age to 66.5, higher than the current plan for the highly contested pension reform, which is to raise the retirement age to 64 .

A recommendation that divided the Grandes Gueules panel this Monday: "COR director Gilbert Cette was put there to replace the previous one who said that the reform was nothing and to say, like Emmanuel Macron, that we must work longer," criticizes teacher Barbara Lefebvre.

"The COR is delivering an analytical, not a political, discourse," said consultant Antoine Diers, while the recommendation irritates the unions. "This means that the current reform is untenable," he added.

And what about the workers? Already shaken by the first reform, Michèle, a physiotherapist in a nursing home, is not happy with this new setback: "Those who ask to work until 66.5 years old, they have never achieved anything," she laments this Monday on RMC and RMC Story . "With our professions, in geriatrics, not even in my dreams," assures Michèle, who at 59 has been working since she was 21. Today, she should retire at 63.5 years old with a full pension.

Michèle advocates for "getting young people to work": "There is training and work-study programs, but we need to provide attractive work."

Pascal, a 52-year-old general insurance agent, believes he could work until he's 66, subject to certain conditions: "Physically yes, but psychologically no, I'm chasing figures every month. There are still special schemes that will manage to get by," he laments.

This COR's position on raising the retirement age, while negotiations are taking place until June 17 to rediscuss the highly contested 2023 reform, annoys unions who continue to fight to reverse the 64 years introduced by the latter.

The CGT union denounced a "totally biased" report attacking a body "on a mission commanded by Emmanuel Macron." "There's a scandal in the fact that only one recommendation is being targeted. Until now, the COR made assumptions and it was up to politicians to decide. This is completely biased," CGT representative Denis Gravouil, responsible for social protection and pensions, told AFP.