Résumé en français : au Royaume-Uni comme en France, le gouvernement a relevé l'âge de la retraite. Mais la même mesure est présentée différemment dans les deux pays, suscitant des réactions bien différentes...

The UK is a very different country compared to France. In France the media talk about the government forcing employees to work longer in order to draw their state pension. In the UK, the Daily Telegraph begins a recent article saying the government “will make it illegal for companies to force staff to give up work at 65”.

In the UK, the picture that the media wishes to convey is of ‘wicked’ employers preventing diligent and dedicated employees from working beyond the age of 65, the inference being this is what they really want to do. In France, the idea is that most employees can’t wait to retire and that it is the ‘wicked’ government who is asking them to work beyond 60 years old.

The reality, of course, in both countries, is that employees in good, rewarding, well-paid jobs they enjoy, may indeed want to work when they are over 65 years of age; but it is likely that the vast majority of British employees, just like their French equivalents, want to retire as soon as possible, if their pension is generous enough to support them.

The brute reality is that while the French public sector complains loudly and bitterly that some workers, either side of a seemingly arbitrary date, will be asked to work another 2 years when the new pension laws are implemented, in the UK the state pension will begin to be awarded at the age of 66 for men – a full 10 years earlier than the 2036 date suggested by the previous Labour government. And in England there will be relatively weak and uncoordinated protests, if at all, most people expecting the Conservative/Liberal coalition government to pass this without much resistance.

After 2050, most people will be expected to work beyond 70 years old; and the same reasons are being given in the UK as in the French media, that life expectancy has increased. A UMP representative on TF1 said that when Mitterand introduced the idea of an age of retirement at 60 years old, people did not enjoy such long lives; now that people are living longer, it is entirely just that they should work longer. A logic that contradicts most of the apologists for new technology, in, for example, the 1970s, who said that computers etc, for all the difficulties they bring, would allow us to offload much repetitive and labourious work and to enjoy greater leisure for our creative and recreational activities.

There is good news for UK citizens in the government announcement. The British people are being promised more generous state pensions when they retire later, those pensions being linked to average earnings once again, after a time when the link between the two had been broken.

The logic of the UK government is maybe interesting in that it assumes that people would rather have money than time, and thus that they will accept working longer if the pension is larger.

The UK is often see as a more materialistic, mercantile country than France, one where “everything has its price,” including time. Whereas France seems to value, at least in public discourse, the opportunity for retired people to enjoy the relaxed activities of old age, time with family and grandchildren, often in a pleasant setting, in the UK what is principally valued -again, in the sphere of the media-, is money. If you continue to earn until you drop you will not resent the time spent at work. Which is not everyone’s experience.

The average age a man dies in the UK is now 77.4 years old. Retirement at 65 will give the average English man 12.4 years of leisure. One hopes they enjoy it.