## Facts

- A statute limited the ability of persons over age 60 to cumulate mandatory retirement pensions with employment income by modifying an existing “solidarity contribution” imposed on such cumulations.
- The law increased contribution burdens for certain higher-income retirees, removed contribution ceilings in some situations, and used thresholds tied to multiples of the statutory minimum wage (SMIC).
- Groups of at least 60 deputies and at least 60 senators sought pre-promulgation constitutional review, arguing violations of equality before the law and public burdens, property rights, the right to work, and protections attached to civil-service pension rights.
- The government justified the scheme as organizing solidarity between working retirees and the unemployed and as supporting the financial balance of social-security and unemployment-compensation systems.

## Issues

1. Whether the legislature may impose increased and partially uncapped solidarity contributions on retirees who cumulate pensions and wages above defined thresholds without violating the right to work and equality before public burdens.
2. Whether applying such contributions—especially to civil-service pensions—impermissibly infringes constitutionally protected pension guarantees and property-related protections.
3. Whether specific classifications and calculation rules created unjustified disparities among similarly situated retirees.

## Decision

- The Constitutional Council held the statute partially unconstitutional.
- It upheld, as a general matter, the legislature’s authority to require a solidarity contribution on cumulated pensions and earnings, including higher rates above specified income thresholds, as consistent with the right to work and social solidarity objectives.
- It recognized that civil-service pension rights are constitutionally protected guarantees within the legislature’s regulatory domain, but may be subject to generally applicable charges that do not negate the right and that comply with equality requirements.
- It struck specific provisions governing application and calculation of the contribution where distinctions or modalities produced unjustified or arbitrary inequality and/or conflicted with the protected guarantees attached to pensions.

## Legal Principles

- The legislature may regulate conditions affecting continued professional activity after retirement age to advance the right to employment for the greatest number and may require contributions from those who work to support those without work, subject to non-arbitrary limits.
- Parliament has broad authority to organize social solidarity and maintain the financial equilibrium of social-security institutions, including structuring contributions linked to pension–salary cumulation.
- Civil-service pension rights constitute fundamental guarantees; legislative measures may affect pensions through general charges only if they respect equality and do not deprive the pension right of meaningful content.
- Differential treatment in social charges must be objectively justified by the law’s purpose and must not impose manifestly disproportionate burdens.

## Conclusion

The Council permitted strengthened solidarity contributions on pension–salary cumulation as a tool of social solidarity and financial balance, while invalidating particular calculation and classification rules that failed constitutional equality requirements or conflicted with protected pension guarantees.


Cumulation of Pensions & Salaries (Cumulation of Pensions and Salaries), No. 85-200 DC (Conseil constitutionnel Jan. 16, 1986)