Wages don't follow inflation, thus leading to a drop in purchasing power and an increase in interest rates. Food and real estate are becoming more unaffordable. Generalized price control must be limited to easily controllable products: energy, medicines, work (increasing the minimum wage). Since the increase downgrades the minimum wage, it is necessary to ask for a wage increase by playing on strong activity and the lack of manpower. Giving a check to consumers without compensation pushes sellers to increase their prices because there is more money to spend, thus maintaining inflation. If gasoline consumption is a problem, you have to be interested in selling consumer vehicles. What to do with your savings? Wait for rates to drop and arrive before prices rise again. Compulsory expenses (rent, water, electricity, tax, internet, insurance) represented 30% of modest budgets in 2001 compared to 40% in 2023, with 23% of gross income dedicated to housing compared to 9% in 1960. Precariousness overlaps, those who cannot find housing are also those who cannot feed themselves and suffer discrimination. More than 1 million people in France are in late with their rent payment. Real estate prices increased by +125% from 2001 to 2020 while gross household income only increased by +30%. In 20 years, real estate has increased 4x more than income. 3.5% of households own more than 5 rental properties and represent half of the rental stock. Multi-owners aged 50 and more represent 70% of multi-owners. Since current young people were not born at the right time, they were not able to take advantage of previous opportunities. According to the Conseil d'Analyse Économique, France has become a country of heirs: "The share of inherited wealth in total wealth represents 60% compared to 35% at the beginning of the 1970s". The median net wealth of people in their thirties was 45% higher than that of those over 70 in 1986, it was 4x lower in 2015. Getting into a Monopoly game in the 10th round is a assured defeat. The cost of housing alone is pushing some young people into the working classes, it is a social time bomb. Earning well no longer guarantees having decent housing. The housing crisis is twofold: cyclical (increase in materials and rates) and structural (construction financed by the private sector meaning fewer social housing units). The number of vacant secondary housing units increases every year and currently exceeds 3 million. The number of multi-owners is increasing, while the number of owners is decreasing. Housing is a fuel for inequality.
Salomé Saqué