According to a study, negotiated terminations often replace resignations.

According to this study, the introduction of negotiated termination in French law in 2008 "led to the transformation of a significant proportion of resignations, thereby opening up a right to unemployment insurance and resulting in an increase in public spending".

The total number of resignations thus decreased by 19% between the period 2003-2006 and 2012-2014, before and after the implementation of the system.

"Moreover, 80 to 95% of employees who have signed a mutual termination agreement receive unemployment benefits and about 80% are still looking for work twenty days after their termination, which suggests that these replaced resignations do not mostly lead to job-to-job transitions," the researchers add.

Last week, Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Farandou denounced before the Senate's Social Affairs Committee those who consider the negotiated termination as "a right to draw on unemployment", stating that "the social partners are in agreement to discuss it", unlike the unemployment insurance agreement as a whole, which was recently renegotiated in November 2024.

"The government wants the negotiated termination agreement to be worked on by the social partners," the minister added this week to reporters.

The negotiated termination "was not created to supposedly please everyone" but "responded to a need and in principle, legally, it is a mutual agreement", said Patricia Ferrand, CFDT vice-president of Unédic, on October 22, during the presentation of the organization's latest financial results.

"So coming to seek responsibility, I'm not sure that's the issue," she added.

The IPP study concludes that negotiated terminations have "replaced a small proportion of dismissals for personal reasons, around 12%." "This low conversion rate is largely due to the existence of conflict between the parties at the time of separation," preventing an amicable agreement for a negotiated termination, the authors explain.

According to Unédic, negotiated terminations now represent the largest expenditure item for unemployment insurance by reason for termination of employment contract, at 28% of the total, which is explained by the fact that fixed-term contracts are not concerned and managers are overrepresented.