Inflation is not just a matter of purchasing power. The rise in prices, and particularly those of energy, the key to mobility, is weighing on morale. The Vulnerability Observatory, created in 2018 by the Research Center for the Study and Observation of Living Conditions (Crédoc) surveyed the French in the summer of 2022, when inflation as a whole reached 6, 1% in France and about 7% for food products.
At this time, when prices have started to climb since mid-2021, four in ten people say they feel “vulnerable”. In one year, this proportion has increased by ten points and, in four years, since the launch of the observatory, the progression is twenty points, according to the results of the barometer published on Saturday, December 17. One in ten people (11%) say they have felt this fragility for less than a year, i.e. “since the prices go up”12% rather link it to the start of the health crisis, i.e. one to two years ago.
“We go from one crisis to another, from the Covid crisis to the energy crisis and the inflationary crisis, notes Sandra Hoibian, general manager of Crédoc. There were periods of inflation, for example in the late 1980s, when optimism was higher, partly because wages followed and it seemed living conditions would improve. »
This vulnerability is reflected in everyday life: difficulty in paying housing costs (electricity, water and gas bills in particular), the fact of having to postpone expenses, including food, the fact of not always being able to “eat the food you want”to limit the diversity of the menus, to have to lower the heating.
Young people most affected
Almost all social categories are concerned; low incomes and the lower middle classes, the unemployed or single, separated or divorced people are, of course, in the front line. But young people concentrate the difficulties in this period. Among those under 25, 53% say they are vulnerable: this is the most affected age category, while seniors are more protected (33%). “Despite all the measures put in place, young people evolve in an increasingly uncertain environment”, decrypts Mme Hoibian. A constant: the fact of not being able to have a car is an aggravating factor of vulnerability.
All social life is affected by this feeling with, in the background, a fear: that of falling into poverty. Among the restrictions that we impose on ourselves to save money, that of reducing leisure, sports or cultural activities – a behavior that increases by 21 points between January 2019 and July 2022. We reduce visits to family and friends (+ 18 points), we give up medical examinations (+ 15 points) or carry out administrative procedures, which worsens the non-use of social benefits.
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