The inflationary crisis is “behind us” in France, but the level of inflation will remain “a little higher” than before the crisis, around 2%, particularly due to the cost of the energy transition, he said. announced this Thursday the Minister of Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire, guest of the CNews/Europe 1 morning show. “It remains very hard for many of our compatriots and the question of wages and prices is a priority because that there are still far too many people for whom this remains difficult” but “the inflationary crisis, I confirm, is behind us (…) we will be below 3% inflation in 2024”, he said. -he declares.
“Everything has increased, we will not return to pre-crisis prices but there will be a very marked slowdown in inflation which will be below 3% in 2024,” he continued, explaining however – wishing to be “completely honest and complete” – that “the structural level of inflation” would remain “a little higher than it was before”. According to him, the justification lies in particular in the fact “that we are relocating activities” and “that the decarbonization of our economy is expensive”. “This means that we have experienced inflation levels around 1%, or even almost zero, and that we will have inflation levels which will be more constantly around 2% instead of being around 1%,” he said.
In November, inflation continued to decline in France, falling to 3.5% over one year compared to 4% in October, according to the National Institute of Statistics. In its latest forecasts published in mid-December, INSEE anticipates inflation at 2.6% over one year next June, compared to 3.7% at the end of 2023 and around 6% at the start of the year. After peaking at almost 16% in the spring, food price inflation should clearly slow down, at 1.9%. The Banque de France predicted that inflation would reach 5.7% on annual average in 2023 and fall to 2.5% in 2024, measured here according to the harmonized consumer price index (HICP) allowing comparison between European countries.
