Poverty in France
Encyclopedia
INSEE
INSEE is the French National Institute for Statistics and Economic Studies. It collects and publishes information on the French economy and society, carrying out the periodic national census. Located in Paris, it is the French branch of Eurostat, European Statistical System...
's criteria, is half of the median income).
Previously, the poor were for the most part retirees. The trend reversed itself in the 1980s with an increase in unemployment among young people; while poverty among the elderly dropped 85% (from 27.3% to 3.8%), among those still in the workforce it increased by 38% over the same 30 years (from 3.9% to 5.4%). Various social welfare programs have had an important impact in low-income households, and in 2002, they may in some cases have represented more than 50% of the household's income.
Status in 2005
Poverty threshold was fixed at 645 euros per person per month. By comparison, the revenu minimum d'insertionRevenu minimum d'insertion
The Revenu minimum d'insertion is a French form of social welfare. It is aimed at people without any income who are of working age but do not have any other rights to unemployment benefits...
(RMI, which idea draws on guaranteed minimum income
Guaranteed minimum income
Guaranteed minimum income is a system of social welfare provision that guarantees that all citizens or families have an income sufficient to live on, provided they meet certain conditions. Eligibility is typically determined by citizenship, a means test and either availability for the labour...
, although it is not distributed to any one) was at that time 440.86 euros per month for a person living alone. The French poverty threshold is slightly higher than that of the United States, suggesting that some who would be considered living in poverty in France would not be if they had the same income in the United States. However, it is difficult to compare them as they are not calculated in the same way, notwithstanding differences in cost
Cost-of-living index
Cost of living is the cost of maintaining a certain standard of living. Changes in the cost of living over time are often operationalized in a cost of living index. Cost of living calculations are also used to compare the cost of maintaining a certain standard of living in different geographic areas...
or standards of living. While the French poverty threshold
Poverty threshold
The poverty threshold, or poverty line, is the minimum level of income deemed necessary to achieve an adequate standard of living in a given country...
is calculated as being half of the median income, the U.S. poverty threshold is based on dollar costs of the economy food plan, that is, on income inequality
Income inequality metrics
The concept of inequality is distinct from that of poverty and fairness. Income inequality metrics or income distribution metrics are used by social scientists to measure the distribution of income, and economic inequality among the participants in a particular economy, such as that of a specific...
In 2005:
- A million children (8%) were living below the poverty line;
- 42,000 children were affected by lead poisoningLead poisoningLead poisoning is a medical condition caused by increased levels of the heavy metal lead in the body. Lead interferes with a variety of body processes and is toxic to many organs and tissues including the heart, bones, intestines, kidneys, and reproductive and nervous systems...
, a sign of decrepit housing; lead-based paint has been banned in new buildings since 1915, to all professionals since 1948, and to everyone since 1993. The risk of exposure to lead today is four times greater for buildings constructed before 1915 than for a building constructed between 1915 and 1948. - 500,000 housing units were unclean.
- 200,000 students were in difficult financial situations, which has led some young women to pay for their studies by selling their "services," e.g. by placing ads for prostitution on the Internet. This phenomenon is on the rise in the country (in 2006, the students' union SUD EtudiantSolidaires Unitaires DémocratiquesThe Solidaires or Solidaires Unitaires Démocratiques is a French group of trade unions.-Political position:They tend to favor progressive or even radical views and work with the alter-globalization or anti-globalization movement....
estimated the number to be 40,000).
Nevertheless, social services allow France to have one of the lowest child mortality
Child mortality
Child mortality, also known as under-5 mortality, refers to the death of infants and children under the age of five. In 2010, 7.6 million children under five died , down from 8.1 million in 2009, 8.8 million in 2008, and 12.4 million in 1990. About half of child deaths occur in Africa....
rates despite this poverty.
Despite the positive developments, it seems that rural areas have been attracting more and more of those left behind; a non-negligible segment of at-risk city populations have been moving to the country and joining the ranks of small-time farmers among "rural" welfare recipients. This phenomenon is partly explained by the lower cost of rural living compared with that in cities.
Another indicator of poverty is the RMI. In 1994, in metropolitan France
Metropolitan France
Metropolitan France is the part of France located in Europe. It can also be described as mainland France or as the French mainland and the island of Corsica...
, the number of RMI recipients was 783,436; ten years later (in June 2004), it rose to 1,041,026. In the overseas departments
DOM
DOM may refer to:*D.O.M. , a restaurant in São Paulo, Brazil*Days on market, how many days since a piece of real estate was listed for sale*Deo optimo maximo, Latin for "to the Greatest and Best God", originally Jove, later the Christian God...
, it was 105,033 at the end of 1994 and 152,892 in June 2004. By 31 December 2005, the figure stood at 1,112,400. From December 2004 to December 2005, the number of RMI recipients increased by 4.7% according to the Secours catholique NGO.
Bidonvilles
Bidonvilles (“can towns”) are shanty towns that exist in the urban outskirts of France and often have little access to roads or public services (such as electricity or access to water). Although once thought to be a phenomenon exclusive to the 1960s and 1970s, bidonvilles again gained attention in the French media in the 2000s. Often populated by immigrants, bidonvilles produce a degree of residential segregation between French nationals and recently-arrived immigrant groups at a scale higher than any other western European city in the postwar years. However, most attention on residential poverty in France is now associated with the Parisian suburbs, or banlieueBanlieue
In francophone areas, banlieues are the "outskirts" of a city: the zone around a city that is under the city's rule.Banlieues are translated as "suburbs", as these are also residential areas on the outer edge of a city, but the connotations of the term "banlieue" in France can be different from...
s.
In the late 1960s, there were eighty-nine bidonvilles on the outskirts of Paris. During this time, bidonvilles were often associated with immigrant groups from North Africa. However this is partly an exaggerated stereotype, as the largest bidonville of the Paris area in the 1960s (Champigny-sur-Marne) was populated mostly by Portuguese. That being said, a Ministry of the Interior census carried out in 1966 suggested that the majority of the 46,827 people living in the 119 Parisian bidonvilles were of North African origin. Other bidonvilles were concentrated north-west of Paris, including near Nanterre, Gennevilliers, Asnières, and Colombes.
In 1964, the Loi Debré sought to eliminate bidonvilles, and the urban formation was erroneously thought to have disappeared in the 1970s with the transformation of Nanterre
Nanterre
Nanterre is a commune in the western suburbs of Paris, France. It is located west of the center of Paris.Nanterre is the capital of the Hauts-de-Seine department as well as the seat of the Arrondissement of Nanterre....
's bidonville into a modern city. However, a 1973 count estimated at least 8,600 still living in bidonvilles around Paris.
First-hand accounts describe the hardship of living in bidonvilles in the 1960s: "We live amongst mud and rubbish. There's no difference between us and animals...It's not life that we lead here: even the rats com to eat us...I tell you – even the animals live better than we do." A former occupant recalled the emotional legacy of life in the Nanterre bidonville even after its destruction:
"Now they've got rid of almost all the bidonvilles at Nanterre, but they still exist in our heads and in our thinking. Life in a bidonville is something you never forget.
However, bidonvilles may have provided certain measures of social freedom and political space for disadvantaged or marginalized groups, albeit at the cost of appalling daily living conditions. For example, established bidonvilles with more experienced immigrant communities could provide a network of support or feeling of solidarity to a newly-arrived migrant greater than what they might find in the city center.
Despite persistent attempts to rehouse individuals living in bidonvilles (and the more fragmented "micro-bidonvilles"), they remain a reality in places like Villeurbanne
Villeurbanne
Villeurbanne is a commune in the Rhône department in eastern France.It is situated northeast of Lyon, with which it forms the heart of the second-largest metropolitan area in France after that of Paris. Villeurbanne is the second-largest city in the department.-History:The current location of...
(Lyons), where a bidonville contains 500 persons of Roma origins, a third of them children. In February 2007, bulldozers destroyed a bidonville in Bobigny
Bobigny
Bobigny is a commune, or town, in the northeastern suburbs of Paris, France. It is located from the center of Paris. Bobigny is the préfecture of the Seine-Saint-Denis département, as well as the seat of the Arrondissement of Bobigny...
, a northeastern suburb of Paris, where 266 Romanian and Bulgarian citizens had been registered.
Bidonvilles are also common in the overseas departments.
See also
- Abbé PierreAbbé PierreLAbbé Pierre, was a French Catholic priest, member of the Resistance during World War II, and deputy of the Popular Republican Movement . He founded in 1949 the Emmaus movement, which has the goal of helping poor and homeless people and refugees...
- Observatoire National de la Pauvreté et de l'Exclusion SocialeObservatoire National de la Pauvreté et de l'Exclusion SocialeThe Observatoire National de la Pauvreté et de l'Exclusion Sociale is an agency of the French government. It aims at assessing poverty and exclusion in France.-Overview:...
- Poverty by country