“zero long-term unemployment territories” trial: conditions for success

The increase in unemployment, and in long-term unemployment in particular, has been a concerning reality in most OECD countries since 2008, and with a 56% increase in the number of long-term unemployed individuals between 2008 and 2013, France is certainly no exception. With this in mind, efforts to identify solutions must be stepped up; indeed, the sustained shortage of employment has particularly serious effects not only on those who fall victim to such phenomena but also on the overall functioning of the economy. Those unemployed individuals who find themselves the furthest removed from the employment market have the lowest chance of finding employment in the event that growth does resume.

The President of the National Assembly has called upon the ESEC to produce an opinion on a territorial trial project designed to demonstrate that it is possible to resolve long-term unemployment by offering useful jobs that are accessible to all concerned. Designed in the form of a territorial trial “at a constant budget”, involving the reallocation of credit that has become groundless in that those benefiting from it will have found employment, the project has also been the subject of a bill that is set to be debated at the National Assembly in the near future.