The Minister of Economy and Finance, Bruno Le Maire, promised Thursday that he would do “whatever is necessary” to reduce France’s public deficit to less than 3% of GDP in 2027. “We will do everything what will be necessary to return below the 3% public deficit in 2027,” Bruno Le Maire declared to journalists, reacting to a report from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which calls on France for “new measures” of savings from 2024 in order to avoid a slippage in public finances, at a time when a new reform of unemployment insurance is presented to the social partners.
“New budgetary consolidation measures are recommended in the medium term starting in 2024, in order to bring the debt back on a downward trajectory,” writes the IMF at the conclusion of a mission in France called “article 4”, which expects a deficit public of 4.5% of GDP in 2027, “significantly higher” than the 2.9% planned by the government. This difference is due, according to the international organization, to the fact that “the main review and expenditure savings measures which underlie the planned adjustment remain to be identified”.
The Washington institution’s short-term forecasts, however, do not take into account the latest announcements from the government, which affirmed in April that it was banking on a “realistic and ambitious” objective to come back below the deficit limit set by Brussels. The executive plans in particular a budgetary effort of 20 billion euros in additional savings in 2024, then another 20 billion in 2025.