Demographic trends and pensions : fifteen years of debate.

• Fewer economically active persons or more pensioners?
• Pensions and productivity gains: what economic growth doesn’t solve...
•  …and what it can facilitate
• Two complementary solutions: savings or working longer

The future of pensions has been a prominent issue in French public debate for at least fifteen years. Two key events were the release of the report entitled “Aging in Solidarity” (Vieillir solidaires) by the State Planning Commission (Commissariat Général du Plan) in 1986 [1, 2] and that of the “White Paper on Pensions” (Livre blanc sur les retraites) in 1991 [3]. Since then, the topic has stayed on the social agenda, with the “Balladur reform” in 1993, the attempt to extend the latter to special pension systems in 1995, the Charpin report in 1999 [4], and the establishment of the Pension Steering Committee (Conseil d’Orientation des Retraites) in 2000, which submitted its first report in fall 2001 [5].