Specialist of demographic changes and family trajectories, Didier Breton is professor of demography at the University of Strasbourg. He is also an associate researcher at the National Institute for Demographic Studies.
Are population movements, analyzed by demographers, anticipated in public policies?
There is always a contextualization of public policies: the demographic framework data is known and shared. But are they really taken into account? This is not obvious. Public policies are often defined in the short or medium term because of the duration of the mandates, and do not project themselves or with difficulty in the long, even very long term, which is that of demography. This is called demographic inertia.
For example, with regard to ageing, public policies rely heavily on family support and home care support systems. However, networks of caregivers are shrinking, resulting in a growing number of single people. But for society to realize this, it takes time. Yet it is obvious, as the figures show. But when the time comes for the usefulness of a public policy, it is often too late. Similarly, blended families, separations of couples with children – well-known social phenomena – are not really taken into account, or belatedly, in housing access and construction policies. This discrepancy is notably linked to the fact that there is no longer an organization working over the long term, as the Plan did in its day, with effects on public policies.
Do you confirm a growing decorrelation between employment and residence?
“People now negotiate, when they are hired, elements relating to their personal quality of life, as much if not more than their salary”
Employment and residence are linked. But in the arbitration between personal and professional life choices, the balance seems to have changed after the health crisis. I say “seems” because we don’t yet have many elements to measure this phenomenon. Employers emphasize this themselves: today, people negotiate, when they are hired, elements relating to their personal quality of life, as much if not more than their salary. Individuals, and in particular the younger generations arriving on the labor market, have also integrated a short-term vision: their quality of life interest them so much as their career prospects. A new balance seems to be taking shape in favor of quality of life.
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