It is not yet certain that the presidential election will take place under health restrictions due to Covid-19, but it appears increasingly likely that it will take place under inflation. Estimated at 2.8% in November by INSEE, inflation should remain high in the coming months, continuing to weigh on the purchasing power of households. “Next year, it will flare up, warned Michel-Edouard Leclerc, president of the large distribution group E.Leclerc, last week on BFM-TV, announcing an upcoming jump in food prices. The politicians must hear us, they will go to the presidential election with an inflation of 4%, with the effects on growth, with the effects on purchasing power. “
The subject has obviously not escaped the executive. Since the fall, the government has stepped up actions in favor of households, seeking to offset in particular the effects of rising energy prices, which represent half of the inflation surge: boost of 100 euros energy checks for nearly 6 million households (580 million euros), inflation compensation of 100 euros for 38 million households (3.8 billion), gas price freeze (1.2 billion), and “shield tariff ”to block electricity tariffs from 2022 (5.9 billion).
Unilateral blocking of the increase in electricity tariffs
In total, without even taking into account the effect of inflation on public accounts, debt or social benefits, more than 11 billion euros additional released in a few weeks by the State, the measures being dispersed between the last amending budget for 2021, adopted in early December, and the finance bill for 2022, whose final vote in Parliament should take place on Wednesday, December 15.
But already, the bill threatens to climb for the public authorities: the increase in the price of electricity that the executive has promised to compensate promises to be faster than expected in 2022. To respond, the executive has given the possibility of unilaterally blocking the increase in tariffs, in an amendment to the 2022 budget.
At the end of the summer, while the end of “whatever the cost” was emerging with the end of the health crisis, inflation nevertheless appeared to be temporary. Bercy even considered half-heartedly that the executive had perhaps reacted a little quickly by signing checks as early as September, in the face of a rebound in prices which was not destined to last. The strength of the recovery and prolonged shortages in several sectors of activity have prompted the Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, to be more cautious. It now expects high inflation at least until the end of 2022. “This is my major concern”, he admitted on BFM-TV Monday, December 13.
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