Various minimum income benefits

Roughly, MSs for working-age people were introduced in three generations.  

In the first period, they acted as complements for categories which were not covered adequately, within a dynamics that was still marked by the expansion of social protection they included benefits for lone parents (API, Allocation de parent isole, from 1976) benefits for the disabled (AAH, Allocation d adulte handicape, 

21 We will limit our study to the minima sociaux for people of working age. 

At a second stage,13 the French system encountered mass unemployment and Allocation de solidarity specifique (ASS) ( unemployment assistance ) was introduced in a major reform of the insurance system from 1982, for beneficiaries who had exhausted their insurance rights (see below, regime de solidarity). 

Minimum vieillesse (minimum protection in old age), the allocation supplemental d invalidity (supplementary assistance to disability pension recipients) and the allocation equivalent retraite, AER (unemployment assistance to older workers) are MSs on behalf of target groups facing particular difficulties in the labour market or of persons no longer available to the labour market. These latter MS are de facto targeted at non-working age individuals and they are not part of activation.  

---