Belfort, Limoges, Saint-Etienne, Compiègne, Aix-en-Provence, Versailles, Mont-de-Marsan, Valenciennes .... This Monday, lawyers from all over France marched through the streets of Paris to protest against the pension reform, at the call of the SOS Retraites collective, which brings together several liberal professions.
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This is the third week of the lawyers' strike. Determined, they left Place de la Bastille around 2 p.m. in the direction of the Opéra Garnier in a festive atmosphere and in a concert of whistles. "Black anger", "No to the retirement tax", "We are not a cash drawer" or even "You push the bar a little too far Manu", could we read in particular on their signs and banners.
Double pension contributions
Why are lawyers currently mobilized? The pension reform project, by providing for the abolition of special schemes in favor of a universal system, will lead to the disappearance of their autonomous scheme - which has a large surplus (2 billion euros in reserves). Lawyers also oppose the doubling of pension contributions provided for by the reform. The latter must go from 14 to 28% for practitioners earning less than 40,000 euros per year, while pensions, currently at least 1,400 euros net, would drop to 1,000 euros.
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“There is a doubling of contributions from 20,000 euros per year and a halving of our pensions. This reform will handicap small incomes. We sacrifice our profession to fill the gaps in the general system. It's a shame, it's theft, " said Philippe Sarfati, a lawyer at the Paris bar, at Le Figaro. "The reform as proposed will lead to the death of the small firms that we represent (...) It is important that this autonomy (Editor's note: from their pension fund) be preserved so that the litigants that we represent can continue to be properly defended, ” said Me Noémie Birnbaum, a lawyer at the Paris bar.
For his part, Alain Reisenthel, former president of the Douai bar, estimated that "no lawyer in France can accept and support that the contribution rates for retirement double for a lower retirement without any compensation" . Before adding: “A retirement that doubles, that makes 28% of the profit. No young lawyer can agree to start his profession by paying almost 30% of his resources only for his retirement and those of others. It is unacceptable and implausible. No one can accept it . ”
Other professions also mobilized
Several other liberal professions were also mobilized during this national demonstration, even if lawyers made up the overwhelming majority of the procession. Doctors, nurses, speech therapists, pilots and even psychomotor therapists also paraded. Like the lawyers, they defended their autonomous fund and protested against the doubling of pension contributions.
“We all have autonomous funds. We are doing very well, we have billions of euros in reserves. Returning to the universal pension system, we will double our contributions: we will go from 14 to 28%. We will either have to close our offices or increase our rates, ” explained in particular to Figaro Marie, a psychomotor therapist in Seine-et-Marne.
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