Lhe law on emergency measures for the protection of purchasing power, promulgated on August 16, 2022, does not seem, at first sight, to pose a problem, apart from the traditional political divisions: who could be against the fact that the we can maintain a certain standard of living especially when we already have all the difficulties to make ends meet?
But it is necessary to agree on what is meant by “purchasing power”, which generally designates the ability to acquire goods necessary for life, starting with the most basic – housing, food, energy – and, if possible, other goods that seem to make life more bearable by escaping the sole quest for daily survival (which is the situation of billions of people on earth anyway), such as the smartphone or television.
In other words, what this “power” makes it possible to buy are private goods available by definition on the market. And it is the great strength of the latter to “offer” to all the goods they ask for.
Behind this evidence, there are actually two trade-offs.
The first is the arbitration between private goods and public goods, which means that in a country like France, most of its inhabitants agree to pay taxes to finance public goods that everyone considers essential for a decent life. , such as education, health, security, mobility or justice.
This means that the acceptance of tax is great because everyone knows what it allows to do, which amounts to accepting to reduce their income, therefore their consumption of private goods, in order to increase the supply of these fundamental public goods. .
Climate and biodiversity
This was not the case throughout the 19the century and the beginning of the XXe century. The introduction of the income tax in 1914 was first opposed by conservatives representing farmers and business and industrial executives. It was also vigorously opposed by the major newspapers of the time, such as Time, The morning and Le Figaro. Finally, it will take the form we know today in 1920 with the introduction of the marginal tax rate.
This arbitration tends to be called into question by current neoliberal policies which aim precisely to reduce the quality of these public goods, as tragically illustrated by the closing of beds during the pandemic or the lack of attractiveness of the teaching profession. But the fact that these policies encounter strong opposition, not only among the personnel concerned, caregivers or teachers, but also in a large public, proves that the arbitration between private goods and public goods is not called into question by the majority and is part of the public debate.
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