Les folios

Edito – «The pessimism of the intelligence, the optimism of the will»

Antonio Gramsci

Already two years! Two years of unanimous opposition to «the biggest crisis» with its resonance of ‘the war to end all wars’ so that nothing would ever be the same. Crisis: this situation which is not dead yet, and yet unborn. European institutions are certainly still continuing (and prolonging) discussions on necessary regulation and its implementation. The financial, economic, and especially social crises are far from over and have created many positive changes with respect to debt reduction, but threaten to exacerbate an already difficult situation for many people. Regrettably, the current period of highly relative calm is not conducive to implementing the decisions announced in the Fall of 2008 intended to subordinate the financial sector to the economy and to, if only modestly, place people—social issues–at the center of societal projects …

Edito – Did you say austerity?

Not so long ago, it simply couldn’t be a question of «recession» today, we struggle to talk about austerity. Even speaking of discipline, which goes along so well with a sense of duty, no longer seems acceptable. Let’s get away from semantic approaches and consider some actual facts!
Government deficit in the euro zone rose from 2% in 2008 to 6.3% of GDP in 2009 (6.9% in the EU).
The highest government deficits run at 14.3% in Ireland,13.6% in Greece, and a surprising 11.5% in the UK, which outstrips Spain’s 11.2% and Portugal’s 9.4%. Meanwhile, even the most virtuous of countries no longer have surpluses but deficits of 0.5% in Sweden, 0.7% in Luxemburg, and 1.7% in Estonia …

Edito – The Coelacanth’s Retirement

As indisputable as the need for pension reform may be, it is nothing short of astonishing to focus on a single parameter concerning the legal age for entitlement to retirement benefits.

Several burdensome trends are forcing us to impose new rules. These stem from two causes. The first, a more “structural” factor is the increasing life expectancy observed in nearly every European Union member state (a year-increase every ten years). The second, an economic concern, results from the massive influx of baby boomers, those born from 1945 to 1973, who are now reaching retirement age. A third, and more worrisome, trend comes from the still poorly understood effects of the financial, economic and social crises. We cannot seriously dismiss them as merely a temporary result of socio-enonomic circumstances.  It doesn’t help to measure structural effects from now until the middle of the century. Economic forecasts through 2050 have certainly been made on solid grounds by “professionals in the field.” The only problem is that their predictions are based on today’s models. In forty years, the economy will certainly have changed, especially considering current environmental challenges…

The scheduling of two extraordinary meetings in the space of a few months, as well as the adoption of new articles of association, are proofs of great vitality, of IPSE’s ability to adjust to the environment and meet member demands. The most recent meeting took up the issue of resources and member representation at general meetings.

The reform consolidates IPSE’s associative basis, already buttressed by the strength of IPSE’s commissions. The change comes at a propitious time, right after the Meeting in Stockholm and its interesting proposals. There the four families of the social economy of

social protection agreed to work toward establishing the necessary conditions to set up a common platform for mutualists, paritairians, mutual insurers, and cooperatives. We at IPSE, meanwhile, are conducting a Steering Board study on the impact of the crisis on European social-protection organizations, with the aim of producing proposals for active development rather than defense. And let us not forget the white paper on solidarity, proposed during IPSE’s 20th-anniversary celebration by Jérôme Vignon, former European Commission director of social protection…