Decrease in the number of beneficiaries of social minima

This is news that will relieve public spending. According to the DREES study, the number of social minima recipients (excluding the temporary waiting allowance and the asylum seeker allowance) fell by 1.8% year-on-year. At the end of 2016, there were 4.15 million people with a social minimum. The pace of the number of recipients had decreased in the two previous years (2.7% in 2014, 1.6% in 2015): in 2016, for the first time in eight years, the number is declining.

This is the RSA, the income of active solidarity, which largely explains this decline in the number of recipients. In 2015, there were 1.95 million households benefiting from this allocation. The following year, the number fell to 1.86 million, a decrease of 4.3%. The DREES explains that it is the young people in particular who leave the RSA: the decline is 9.3% for young people under 30 years, then 4.3% for recipients aged 30 to 49, then 0 , 6% for the age group from 50 to 59 years.

This decline in the number of recipients of the RSA is the result of "less deterioration of the labor market between late 2012 and late 2015," says the research direction. The improvement in employment from 2016 played its role, as did the introduction of the activity bonus in early 2016. This bonus replaced the RSA activity. All this contributes to the decline in the number of beneficiaries of the RSA.