Debt and public spending, François Ruffin
Announced savings: €20m of savings at the Élysée, end of the life annuity for former leaders
Direction of change: increase, compared with current law.
The lever. Amount and nature of the spending savings the programme announces, with their timetable. Direction rule: ↑ larger announced savings.
« Nous ferons 20 millions d’euros d’économies sur le budget de l’Élysée : finies les commandes exorbitantes de vaisselle en céramique ! La rente post-mandat accordée aujourd’hui à vie aux anciens Présidents et aux anciens Premiers ministres sera supprimée. »1Translation by the editorsWe will make 20 million euros of savings on the Élysée budget: no more exorbitant orders of ceramic tableware! The post-mandate annuity currently granted for life to former Presidents and former Prime Ministers will be abolished.
Encoding
| Parameter | Current law | Programme | Effective date or horizon |
|---|---|---|---|
| Saving on the State grant to the Presidency of the Republic | 0 €m | 20 €m | Savings in 2032 compared with the baseline trend; the baseline itself is not published (Fipeco) |
Costing
Announced by the candidate
+€0.02bn
per year, gain for the public accounts. « Nous ferons 20 millions d’euros d’économies sur le budget de l’Élysée » [“We will make €20m of savings on the Élysée budget”]
Published costings
none
No external costing of this position recorded to date.
Our calculation
+€0.02bn
per year for the public accounts, saving. Candidate’s amount, taken as is.
The calculation
- Saving on the State grant to the Presidency of the Republic: (20 − 0) ÷ 1 = 20 times “€1m saving on the grant to the Presidency of the Republic”, each a gain of €0bn (0 to 0).
Partial costing. The €20m of savings on the Élysée are read against the State grant to the Presidency. The abolition of the annuity for former presidents and prime ministers is not costed.
Figure announced by the candidate: candidate’s amount, taken as is.
Current law, sources and limits of the cost schedule
Current law. LFI 2026 (OFCE calculations): structural primary effort by the State, excluding the EU contribution, of €11bn (0.4 points of GDP), €16bn on its other items when the increase in the defence budget is taken into account; savings of €4bn in the LFSS and €3bn for local authorities (0.1 points of GDP each); overall budgetary effort of €16bn (0.5 points of GDP), €22bn excluding the increase in interest charges. In 2025, net primary expenditure grew by only €12.5bn (+0.8%), thanks to €23bn of new revenue.
Horizon. Savings in 2032 compared with the baseline trend; the baseline itself is not published (Fipeco).
Limits. An announced amount of savings is counted only through the measures that make it up; on its own, it is a target. Benchmark: primary savings in the 2026 initial finance act (LFI), €18bn. An announced amount is counted only if it is backed by identified measures; the rest is a target, flagged and not added. Bercy's baseline trend is not published, which makes « économies par rapport au tendanciel » [“savings relative to the baseline trend”] unverifiable. A global amount overlaps the sectoral levers. Appropriation for the Presidency: amount in the PLF 2026 (€122.56m, stable since 2025); that of the finance act as voted is not cited. One euro less of appropriation is worth one euro of savings for the State; the Élysée's spending budget (€126.28m in 2026) is slightly broader than the appropriation. Option cir-reserve-pme-eti (rule on public bases, 18 October 2026: a named saving is calculated on its measure): in 2019, large companies received €3bn of research tax credit, 45% of the « CIR recherche » [“research CIR”] and 42% of the total claim (€7.12bn, MESR (Ministry of Higher Education and Research)); applied to the cost of the CIR in 2026 (€7.7bn to €8.1bn, Voies et moyens, option fin-cir of the “Tax and social security expenditures” lever), this share gives €3.24bn to €3.41bn; lower bound, the 2019 amount (editors' calculation; revenue loss assuming unchanged behaviour, like any tax expenditure). The CIR is a tax expenditure: declared overlap with its abolition and with the across-the-board cut in tax expenditures.
- OFCE, Le déficit public devrait diminuer en 2026 et 2027, 2026-04: « les économies attendues issues la Loi de finances de la Sécurité Sociale (LFSS 2026) […] atteindraient 4 milliards d’euros en 2026 (0,1 point de PIB). […] Les économies prévues du côté des collectivités locales seront de 3 milliards d’euros en 2026 (0,1 point de PIB). L’État devrait ainsi réaliser un effort structurel primaire hors contribution à l’UE (PSR-UE) de 11 milliards en 2026 (0,4 point de PIB). Si l’on tient compte de la hausse substantielle du budget de la défense en 2026 (+0,2 point de PIB), alors l’effort de l’État sur les autres postes budgétaires devra être de 16 milliards d’euros (0,5 point de PIB). […] Cela représente un effort budgétaire global de 16 milliards d’euros en 2026 (0,5 point de PIB) et de 22 milliards d’euros si l’on exclut la hausse de la charge d’intérêts (soit 0,7 point de PIB). »
- Fipeco, La croissance tendancielle des dépenses publiques, 2026-09-18: « la direction générale du trésor ... et la direction du budget établissent des scénarios tendanciels à moyen terme ... Leurs travaux ne sont pas publiés. »
- Sénat, commission des finances, « L'essentiel » sur la mission Pouvoirs publics, PLF 2026 (rapporteur spécial Grégory Blanc), 2025-10: « « Le budget 2026 prévoit des dépenses de 126,28 millions d'euros, soit une hausse de 0,54 % (+ 0,68 millions d'euros) par rapport à 2025, dans un contexte de stabilité de la dotation de l'État (à 122,56 millions d'euros) » ; tableau : « 501 - Présidence de la République 122 563 852 » »
- MESR, « Le crédit d'impôt recherche en 2019 » (données semi-définitives, octobre 2022), 2022-10: « En 2019, le montant du crédit d'impôt recherche (CIR) s'élève à 7,12 Md€ pour les trois dispositifs, dont 95 % au titre de la recherche […] Au titre du seul « CIR recherche », les PME forment 83 % des 15 700 bénéficiaires et apportent 26 % du total des dépenses de recherche déclarées, soit une créance de 1,9 Md€ (28 %, un niveau similaire à celui des entreprises de taille intermédiaire, ETI). Les grandes entreprises (GE) bénéficiaires déclarent 48 % des dépenses de recherche et bénéficient d'une créance de 3 Md€ (45 % de la créance au titre de la recherche). »
How to read these amounts. These are static costs and revenues, with no feedback effect, over a full year: nothing on growth, employment or the revenue that economic activity would gain or lose. A higher net cost does not on its own make a worse policy, nor net savings a better one: each programme rests on an economic model (demand-led stimulus, lower compulsory levies, consolidation of the public accounts…) that the cost schedule does not settle. GDP itself measures a volume of activity, not well-being or the usefulness of what is produced. Economic models and feedback effects.
- Cahier « Pour séparer l'argent de l'État ». Read the programme page.
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