Insee Première · October 2022 · n° 1926

In 2020, the earned incomes of self-employed persons fell

At the end of 2020, 3.6 million people were self-employed in France. Excluding the agricultural sector, the number of so-called "traditional" self-employed persons barely decreased (–0.2% over one year), since support measures during the pandemic lessened business failures. The number of micro-entrepreneurs was still significantly increasing (+10.2% in 2020) and their share reached 43% of all self-employed persons.

Between 2019 and 2020, penalized by the pandemic and the induced drop in activities, the average income of self-employed persons decreased: –5.8% in constant euros for "traditional" self-employed persons (an average of €3,620 monthly) and –7.2% for the micro-entrepreneurs (€550). Almost all levels of the income scale fell but the fall was more and more important when descending in the lower levels of this scale. These drops took into account measures to reduce social security contributions, without which they would have been more important, but it didn’t take into account exceptional aids paid under other support schemes which were not considered as earned income.