Recently, the question of work has returned to the public debate, and we can only rejoice about it. Aging of the population, artificial intelligence, tougher international competition, ecological transition: so many issues that call for thinking collectively about what work is today and what it will be tomorrow, particularly with a view to the presidential election.
But do the terms of the debate live up to expectations? We conducted the survey with IDDRI and asked the question to four categories of workers: care workers, “yellow vest workers”, small bosses and “dissatisfied executives”. Everyone feels distanced from political narratives about work. And hope for a renewal.
The blind spots of stories
Whether they are accountants or engineers, traders or small business owners, order preparers or care assistants, nurses or teachers, the French people we interviewed during our study converge on the same observation: the political offers proposed to them miss their target and struggle to renew themselves. The “work less, but better” of the left is mechanically opposed to the “work more” of the right and the center.
Whether it is the story of “the value of work”, which should be reestablished in the face of an “epidemic of laziness” threatening the future of the country, the fiction of the “deserving worker”, a hero surrounded by “parasites” from below and by the “absurd standards” imposed from above, or a miserabilist vision of work deprived of meaning, whose benefits are reserved only for the bosses, all have blind spots, none is satisfactory.
Without a doubt, these stories function as rallying signs: the French know perfectly well how to decode them and attribute them to their transmitters. But none of them do justice to their work experience or meet their aspirations. Their conclusion is clear: “The ideas are not in line with the work”, and “it’s the same subjects all the time”.
A life’s work
What characterizes their experience of work is ambivalence. Work is a foundation of their identity. It means a lot to them – even more than elsewhere. For 62% of them, it is very important in their existence, compared to only 44% among Germans and 45% among the British, according to the Eurofound survey on work. For many, it is their life’s work and being able to do their job well is a central aspiration.
But to satisfy it, the conditions must still be met. And that’s where the problem lies. Many describe a deterioration in working conditions. From one group to another, the causes vary: intensification of tasks, lack of relationships with hierarchy, management problems, administrative constraints, pressure from indicators, figures, procedures or standards, etc.
But those we heard share the same feeling: “We are often proud and passionate about what we do, but the conditions cause us to become disgusted. » In this regard, the irruption of AI at work does not appear so much as a rupture as as a revealer of pre-existing problems – and in particular that of a dehumanizing slope of work, particularly among executives or workers who felt close to the yellow vests.
New hardships
So the question is not so much whether people still enjoy working as whether or not they can still enjoy their jobs. Or again, it is not so much about asking people to work less – they do not want that – as to be able to work well – they hope so. The French first expect political discourse on work to be faithful to these lived experiences, which are both sources of pride and frustration.
They then aspire to see the candidates take up the issue of working conditions, which is a prerequisite for everything else. For example, by taking up certain recommendations from research (see What do we know about work? and Working better, co-directed by Christine Erhel and Bruno Palier). In this area, there is no shortage of public policy proposals. It’s the good political stories that are lacking.
This observation is particularly true for the conduct of the ecological transition. If the French do not spontaneously make the link with work, those we have heard are aware that climate change will introduce new hardships and put pressure on certain professional practices. The latest episodes of heatwave have reminded us of this.
Rehumanizing work
They also fear political inertia on this subject, while fearing further loss of autonomy at work if the transition was poorly orchestrated. They do not see it as an opportunity for better meaning at work: many already have the feeling of being useful through their contribution to national productivity, in their care profession, or their interest in service. Nor do they, rightly, expect it to provide better quality jobs.
On the other hand, they perceive it as an opportunity to regain productive and industrial control and as an opportunity to rehumanize work, and particularly at the local level. A source of renewed pride and strengthening of work collectives, in short. It therefore appears that the association between ecological transition and work does not give rise to tensions, it does not harbor controversies: but it needs to be constructed.
Some players are already moving in this direction: on the CFDT side, the “Workplaces” system aims to promote exchanges between players in environmental transformations and work players based on the experiences and expectations of workers. And on June 5, 2026, the Solidarités Nouvelles Facing Unemployment association launched its manifesto to promote sustainable full employment by 2040 – sustainable in every sense of the word.
There are levers to pull to tell another story, more faithful to reality and lived experience: that of French people confident in their workforce and ready to take on these challenges, on two conditions – that we recognize their involvement in their profession and that we improve their working conditions.
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