It sometimes happens in the history of nations that the privileged come to understand that what they regard as rights is nothing more than the remnant of a doomed order, and that it is better to renounce them in a single night than to have them torn away by the Reign of Terror. This was the case on the night of August 4–5, 1789: at the initiative of the Breton Club, representatives of the nobility and the clergy relinquished seigneurial rights, tax exemptions, tithes, and provincial privileges. These privileges also disappeared out of self-interest: by renouncing what they could no longer retain, the privileged hoped to save what was essential.
Today, a new “Night of August 4” is needed—no longer between social classes, but between generations.
In aging societies—and in France more than elsewhere—a segment of the population now enjoys benefits that stem not from what they do, but from who they are. For while not all retirees are well-off, they collectively benefit from rules designed in a different era to address poverty among the elderly—a condition that is no longer the norm. In France, poverty now primarily affects children and young adults, whereas the average standard of living for retirees—when home ownership is factored in—is equal to that of the working population; and the median wealth of households aged 70 and older is nearly ten times that of households under thirty. A significant portion of the wealth of older adults—honestly acquired through their work and the wise investment of their savings, but above all due to their date of birth—is the very definition of a privilege: an advantage tied to a status. And today, that status is defined by age.
Meanwhile, young people can only become homeowners with the—very rare—help of their parents; and they are delaying entering into a relationship and having their first child. It is well established that the gap between the desire to have children and actually doing so is largely due to the cost of housing, financial insecurity, and delayed career stability. As a result, the ratio of people aged 20–64 to those aged 65 and older has fallen from 3.6 in 2009 to 2.5 in 2025, and is projected to be only 1.62 by 2070. If we continue down this path, young people will soon no longer be able to finance the privileges of the elderly.
Three voluntary sacrifices are therefore necessary:
- Transfer assets during one’s lifetime. The law already provides tools that are underutilized: each parent can give 100,000 euros to each child every fifteen years without transfer taxes, in addition to 31,865 euros for family cash gifts; and, until December 31, 2026, gifts intended for the purchase of a new home or for energy-efficiency renovations are tax-exempt up to 100,000 euros per donor. We should go further: introduce a tax system on asset transfers that is lighter the younger the beneficiary is, and heavier the later the transfer occurs, to encourage intergenerational transfers.
- Accept lower pensions for the wealthiest. Germany introduced a “sustainability factor” as early as 2004 that curbs pension increases when the ratio of contributors to retirees deteriorates; Japan introduced a macroeconomic adjustment mechanism that same year; Sweden implemented an automatic balancing mechanism that led to nominal reductions in pensions, which were accepted because the rule was known in advance. In contrast, in France, the 10% tax deduction on pensions—(unanimously passed by both chambers in 1978, at the initiative of Prime Minister Raymond Barre)—which has never had any justification whatsoever, persists with everyone’s support. But reducing pensions to cover the deficit would amount to plunder; any savings made on high pensions must be allocated to student housing, child care, and family policy.
- For the “future elderly,” working longer In the long term, it will be necessary, in France as in other European countries, to raise the age for full retirement to 65. Every additional month means extra contributions, pensions paid out later, and higher productivity. Obviously, the effort must be proportionate to one’s ability to make it: a construction worker who began an apprenticeship at sixteen is not the same as an executive who started working in an office at twenty-four.
These sacrifices fall under what Tocqueville called “the well-understood interest”: if young people live better lives, they will buy homes, pay down the public debt, and have the means to fund their elders’ pensions. A society that sacrifices its youth condemns itself to a miserable old age.
Yet we must not be content to merely repeat the events of the night of August 4, whose generous gestures were called into question the very next day by Parliament—to the point that it took the Reign of Terror for those privileges to be truly abolished.
Today, the initiative must come from the elderly themselves, who must have the courage to propose what lawmakers and presidential candidates dare not say. Like the Viscount of Noailles and the Duke of Aiguillon in 1789, leading figures of the baby-boom generation must call on their generation to take this step. One could imagine, for example, a “grandparents’ appeal,” through which thousands of retirees would commit to transferring a significant portion of their wealth to their children within five years and to supporting the necessary reforms in taxation and pension law.
For my part, I am ready to do so.
Image:National Assembly, Renunciation of All Privileges, in Versailles, session held on the night of August 4–5, 1789.
Isidore-Stanislas Helman (engraver), after Charles Monnet (drawer).