Economist Antoine Bozio on François Bayrou's 40 billion cuts: "There are problems with the clarity of the budgetary choices"

François Bayrou is due to present his budgetary decisions for 2026 on Tuesday, July 15. Antoine Bozio, director of the Institute of Public Policy (IPP), lecturer at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences and associate professor at PSE-Paris School of Economics, discusses the major challenges of this high-risk exercise and the options for finding 40 billion euros.

François Bayrou wants to find 40 billion euros to reduce the deficit from 5.4 % this year to 4.6 % in 2026. What does this amount to?

40 billion is a measure calculated in relation to a counterfactual [a fictitious budget, editor's note] which projects the evolution of public spending in 2026 if no measures were taken. But the elements of this The initial document, determined by the Ministry of Finance, is not yet known. We know that certain public expenditures are increasing: the aging of the population means that we need more health spending, medical innovations mean that more expensive drugs are arriving... We know