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Faced with the multiplication of crises — the climate emergency and biodiversity loss, the energy crisis prolonged by conflicts, industrial fragility, the weakening of public services, democratic distrust and rising inequalities — it is necessary to rethink public policies in terms of their dynamic effects: on economic activity, employment, prices, public revenues and the productive structure. However, political programmes are still often discussed and assessed through a static and short-term analytical framework, which reduces the debate to a simple balance between expenditure and revenue. This approach overlooks the structural transformations of the economy, the differentiated effects on different social groups and sectoral dynamics. If, instead, we adopt a dynamic and long-term perspective, capable of going beyond the horizon of a single presidential term, the picture changes: some trade-offs presented as inevitable appear, in fact, to be counterproductive.

Starting from this analysis, the collective of economists Ecohesion France proposes an alternative budget, conceived as a coherent and financially viable set of public policies, rather than as a simple catalogue of measures. The dossier combines fairer taxation, lasting reinvestment in public services, the enhancement of waged work and greater recognition of non-waged work, a climate policy equal to the urgency of the situation, and explicit consideration of planetary boundaries in economic decision-making. Social justice is not treated as an adjustment variable, but as the central criterion: when measures are comparably effective, priority is given to those that reduce inequalities and protect the households most exposed to shocks. This is the condition for making a real ecological and social shift possible.

The report therefore offers both a diagnosis and a toolbox for rethinking the economy. By integrating the long term, social inequalities and ecological constraints, Ecohesion France shows that, in the context of 2027, a budget oriented towards an ecological and social shift is more credible, more sustainable and more protective than a new cycle of supply-side policies. What is still presented as the only form of economic realism no longer stands up to the facts. It is time to open a new phase, in which economic success is also, and above all, measured through the reduction of inequalities, the quality of public services and respect for planetary boundaries.

To download the dossier (in french), click here.