France is aiming to cut its budget deficit by 100 billion euros (US$121 billion) by 2013 and bring it down to the EU target of 3 percent of GDP, French Prime Minister Francois Fillon said on Saturday.
Fillon said about half the amount would come from public spending cuts and the balance from the suppression of tax exemptions and higher tax receipts, spurred by economic growth.
PLEDGE
“We have made the pledge to bring down our deficit to 3 percent from 8 percent by 2013 and all our efforts will be focused on this priority,” Fillon told a gathering of UMP party members in Paris.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy visits Berlin today to discuss European economic policy.
France is looking to anchor its commitment to tighter fiscal policy after Berlin announced plans earlier this month to make savings totaling 80 billion euros by 2014.
France said last month it would freeze public spending over the next three years, cut state operating costs by 10 percent and save another 5 billion euros from eliminating certain tax exemptions.
France’s stability pact with Brussels entails a budget deficit of 6 percent of GDP next year, 4.6 percent in 2012 and 3 percent in 2013, based on economic growth of 2.5 percent as of next year.
“Our handicap compared to Germany, in terms of structural reforms, debt and deficit reductions, is catching up with us,” Jean-Pierre Jouyet, head of the French markets regulator AMF, told Le Monde newspaper in an interview published on Saturday.
SALARY CUT
Jouyet also offered to take a salary cut to share the pain. He told Le Monde he would not be against seeing his 300,000 euros annual salary slashed by 20 percent to 30 percent.
“This seems to me to be justified,” Jouyet said. “Public sectors workers must be ready to participate in a common effort.”
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