Purchasing power: at Marion, 36, “for a year and a half, there hasn’t been a month in which we haven’t ended up in the – franceinfo

“I upset him.” Marion walks away from the dusty old computer on the coffee table, takes advantage of the black bike’s loading time to take a sip of tea, then returns to the keyboard. She shifts the device an inch – the charger cable is finicky. Be patient again. That’s it ! The balance of his bank account finally appears on the screen: 631 euros. “Not so bad”, for the end of the first week of October, concludes the 30-something, tattoo on the back of the arm and hair pulled up in a loose bun.

This ritual will be repeated two more times in the month, to keep an eye on family finances. However, this dynamic brunette mainly keeps the accounts in her head. With two salaries, one of 1,500 euros net (the minimum wage is 1,258 euros) and the other 908 euros (for a part-time), the budget of Marion and her husband, Julien, parents of two daughters aged 6 and 8, does not tolerate any deviation.

On the housing side, the couple spend 302 euros each month to reimburse the social home loan over twenty-five years which enabled him to become the owner, in 2012, of the first floor of a house on the edge of Saint-Etienne (Loire). The location of the building, wedged between the highway and the railroad tracks in a modest neighborhood, is not “ideal”, concedes Marion. But the monthly loan payments for this “ruined” the charm of the old (large windows, parquet and fireplace in the living room) were lower than the rent of a T3. And too bad if everything has to be redone over the years: electricity, insulation, painting, kitchen floor, bathroom … Two years ago, Julien and Marion took out a second loan for remedy the infiltration of the facade – for 130 euros per month. On the other hand, they accommodate the apple-green paneling that adorns the staircase, or the red wall of the living room left by the former owners.

We must add to these first expenses 284 euros monthly credit, again, for the car bought two years ago; 167 euros of gas and electricity; 160 euros from mutual; 240 euros in gasoline for Julien, who travels 50 km round trip each day by car to reach the toy library where he works in Saint-Just-Saint-Rambert (Loire); 60 euros of various insurance; 107 euros of property tax; 44 euros for the internet box and 28 euros for telephone packages; 450 euros of groceries and 32 euros of canteen, 134 euros of extracurricular to look after the children because the couple works in the evening and on Saturdays … “For a year and a half, there hasn’t been a month where we haven’t ended up in the red”, sighs Marion, also a toy library in a town in the department.

Due to its budget, the family banned “pleasure shopping” like books or clothing for adults, deprives himself of medical care (dentist for him, shrink for her, who nevertheless describes herself in “burn-out”), gives up changing the fridge before Christmas, which breaks down after fifteen years of service, goes on vacation only ten days a year, in summer, camping, and has never been able to finance extracurricular activities for girls. So when Marion sees the ministers parade on the TV sets, bragging about the increase in purchasing power, she bursts with rage.

“Where is the purchasing power for us? We are never in the fun, always in the useful.”

However, the housing tax (96 euros per month) has disappeared, the energy check relieves them each year from 175 euros in bills, just like the boiler offered by Marion’s parents at Christmas 2018 and which reduced their consumption by 10 euros per month. The couple benefits from the re-entry allowance (740 euros per year for their daughters), family allowances (130 euros per month) and the activity bonus (346 euros per month). Marion and Julien have also earned a hundred euros a month by quitting smoking – “more for savings than for health reasons” –, about twenty others by making all their household products, a few dozen more by taking advantage of Marion’s talents as a seamstress and gardener, which make it possible to limit purchases.

But the prices of diesel, food and energy have continued to increase, reducing from year to year the share of the couple’s “disposable” income. And the arrival of their two daughters forced them to become even more frugal. “We make an effort, we get up every morning to work and we have the impression of being in an increasingly difficult situation”, gets carried away Marion, who wonders what the family will still be able to “deprive” with the announced increase in electricity prices.

Marion says to herself “angry”. Angry with the government, for whom the couple did not vote – this former communist activist and her husband supported Benoît Hamon in the first round of the 2017 presidential election, then abstained in the second round. Angry with those like them who flirt with the poverty line (less of 1,063 euros per month for a single adult), but vote for “a banker” or the extreme right “who has nothing to do with our interests”. Angry, finally, with those who “spit on the poor” and of which it is necessary “to type the lessons of morals, to hear that we manage our budget badly or that we should find a job that pays more”.

“I feel like I am constantly despised by those who govern us.”

And then there is exhaustion, “to count everything, all the time” and “to arbitrate between expenses”, Marion sighs. She calls it “the mental burden of the poor”. Yet she knows full well that she is not “the most to be pitied”. When she was a student in art history, then a young worker, the 36-year-old toy librarian experienced the “dries up”, the real one, the one that pushed her to steal a piece of bread every morning from the kebab on her street for lunch. Now she has a home of her own, in a family where “no one had ever owned”, meals on his plate, a movie at Christmas, a new book or an appointment with the hairdresser the rare times when the end of the month is not too hard. In 2020, she even “fart the Champomy” to celebrate the signing of his part-time CDI (for lack of anything better). Because she has known worse, Marion refuses help from associations to feed or clothe her family. “We don’t want to take from those who have less”, she justifies.

But despite her pride, the 30-something confesses to be consumed with shame. The shame of poverty, which she first knew “pegged to the body” from his mother – a town hall secretary who raised her two daughters alone – before becoming his. The shame of skipping a meal, without telling anyone, when the bank account turns red. The shame of having to choose between the grandfather’s birthday present and the purchase of new shoes for Thaïs, his younger daughter. The shame of envying his in-laws, who can go on vacation for more than ten days a year. The shame of telling the truth to loved ones – “I do not want to pass for the one who complains, nor that I am looked at with pity”. Shame of convey his shame to his daughters, who do not hide their financial difficulties while trying to protect them. And, then, finally, the shame of being ashamed of being poor, since“One is happy”.