” Always more ! », Exclaimed, at the beginning of the 1980s, the journalist François de Closets in a best-selling book documenting the accumulation of inequalities. Why use his formula today for your new essay, “Even more!” “?
Louis Maurin: At the time, the crisis was only taking its first steps: the well-to-do classes were getting richer than the others, but the distribution of income was increasing overall. Four decades later, unemployment and precariousness have settled in society, with a turning point from the 2000s. While the better-off continue to get richer, part of the working classes are put on a diet.
Since the 2008 crisis, this stagnation also concerns the middle classes. The shock is formidable, it’s a bit like when you stop in a car without having the seat belt: you take the window. The stagnation of incomes for the lower and middle classes feeds strong tensions, rekindled by the context of growing uncertainty about incomes and rampant precariousness, for young people in particular.
The latter find themselves in a paradoxical situation: while we claim to value autonomy and responsibility in the professional world, they are in a position of strong submission to authority, with application workers who are disabled by the algorithm if they take too long to deliver their package.
Why is it important to remember that the privileged in France are not limited to the fringe of the super-rich?
The constitution of colossal fortunes is indecent. The voracity of the richest 1% is endless. But to focus on a very narrow fringe of the population is to shy away from solidarity. To fight against inequalities, we must target the wealthiest 20%, those who receive more than 2,600 euros net per month for a single person after taxes. It is the France of senior executives and graduates of good schools, the economic and cultural bourgeoisie which refuses to see its privileges.
On the other side of the spectrum, we must not fall into miserability. The popular France is made up of workers, employees in the services, people who have not had access to studies, it is a predominantly female France which scoops up the most difficult jobs. These people are not in distress, but their way of life is far removed from that of the economic and cultural bourgeoisie.
They fail to respond to the injunctions of the consumer society, such as going on vacation regularly. A form of social contempt overwhelms this France which runs on diesel, smokes cigarettes, does her shopping at the supermarket, does not always eat organic, does not do exhibitions every Sunday.
You have 58.22% of this article to read. The rest is for subscribers only.
www.lemonde.fr