The PER, a massive tax exemption tool… provided you have the means to make payments into your retirement savings plan. Which is not necessarily the case for young professionals. Thus, as specified by two amendments to the finance bill (PLF) for 2026 adopted in session at the National Assembly on Monday, November 3, “the peak of subscription of PER occurs between 50 and 59 years old, this age group representing 29% of new members in 2022”. The French are therefore starting late to open their PER, a tunnel product which offers a tax deduction on payments of up to 10% of taxable income, in return for taxation on exit. Reason why the two amendments to the 2026 budget, tabled by the deputy for the North Félicie Gérard (Horizons & Indépendants) and the elected representative for Marne Charles de Courson (Libertés, independents, overseas and territories group, Liot), requested more flexibility for subscribers to a retirement savings plan.
More precisely, the two measures passed extend “from three to five years the reference period allowing a taxpayer to use the unused portion of the deduction ceiling for voluntary payments made to a retirement savings plan”. Because as a reminder, if the subscriber can “tax-free” up to 10% of his professional income for the current year through payments into his PER, he can also do so over the last three years and use the deduction limits not used.
On a PER, a tax deduction of up to 6 times its annual ceiling!
For example, with an annual income of 40,000 euros since 2022, if he has already subscribed to a PER that year, the holder could claim 4,000 euros of tax deduction for 2022, 2023 and 2024. If he makes 15,000 euros in payments for the first time in 2025, he can thus consume 4,000 euros for the current financial year, but also for 2024, 2023 and 2022, for a total of 16,000 euros. Result: their entire payment will be deductible from their 2025 income declared in 2026. With the adoption of the amendments by Félicie Gérard and Charles de Courson, co-authors of a parliamentary report on the retirement savings plan presented in the fall of 2024, the deadline for using deduction ceilings will increase to five years. This would allow, for payments made in 2026, to go up to the ceiling for the year 2021.
This proposal received the support of the general budget rapporteur, Philippe Juvin (Hauts-de-Seine, Republican Right), who estimated that “this amendment takes note that the age for opening a PER is becoming later and later” and mentioned a measure of “common sense”. Unlike the Minister of Public Accounts, who was surprised: “We can already accumulate (the deductions, Editor’s note) over four years, the first year then the three years before. It would seem excessive to us to increase the ceilings.” A balanced posture on which Amélie de Montchalin was not followed, the two amendments having been largely adopted (104 votes against 62) in the Hemicycle.
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