Budget: how the government plans to make ten billion additional savings this year

It’s a bit like razors with multiple blades: each time, the next blade shaves a little more. While the government had already urgently announced in February 10 billion euros in savings on this year’s budget, here he declares that he is looking for an additional ten billion to try to bring back public deficit of 5.5% in 2023 at 5.1% this year (initially planned at 4.4%), before a return below the 3% mark (2.9% exactly) hoped for in 2027.

“This high figure for the 2024 deficit is the direct consequence of the strong slippage recorded in 2023, where it reached 5.5% of GDP instead of the 4.9% forecast, due to revenues much lower than expected,” said recalled Bercy during the publication this Wednesday of France’s revised stability program (PSTAB). This must be presented to the Council of Ministers on April 17, before being sent to Brussels for examination in June.

Resell up to a quarter of the state’s real estate

How does the State intend to go about achieving the new objectives it has set for itself? “Three complementary levers of effort will be activated,” we detail at Bercy. The first, and undoubtedly the most important, will concern public administrations, to the tune of five billion. It must be remembered that out of the previous ten billion, eight billion were already carried by them. But we must go further, and we will clarify the avenues in the coming days or weeks. »

Among these options, one already mentioned will consist of reselling up to a quarter of the real estate held by the State. The effort will also be supported by local authorities. “It is not so much a question of asking them for additional efforts,” the Ministry of the Economy explains, “as of succeeding in returning to the budgetary objectives that had been set for them. In 2023, we saw a slippage in their operating expenses of almost four billion euros compared to what was expected. »

Of these four billion, the government hopes to recover at least two this year. Which would therefore already bring the level of these new savings to seven billion.

“Tackling exceptional rents” of companies

An additional three billion would remain to achieve the objectives. After the administration and communities, attention naturally turns to businesses. “We are clearly going to tackle exceptional annuities earned through contexts that go beyond the norm,” confirms an advisor.

In the sights of the State: these companies which buy back their own shares. Already in March 2023, during a television interview, Emmanuel Macron had announced his intention to ask the government to work on an “exceptional contribution” on “exceptional corporate profits”, going so far as to denounce “cynicism » of certain large groups (CAC 40) who use their “very exceptional income” to “buy back their own shares”. The idea would therefore be to tax these redemptions.

Another option, finally: increase the pressure on energy companies, to also tax the super profits that they have been able to make thanks to the surge in electricity prices. Already implemented last year, this tax brought in ten times less than was hoped, bringing only 300 million euros into the state coffers, when the forecasts of the Energy Regulatory Commission were instead counting on three billion euros.

There remains margin, therefore, which the government does not intend to leave in the hands of these companies. Otherwise, there is the risk of seeing its debt once again downgraded by the three main rating agencies – Fitch, Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s – in the coming weeks.