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Employers will be setting aside 2 percent of their wage pools, as from 2018, with most of the money to be paid into a governmental account, Minister of Public Finance Ionut Misa announced on Thursday. "Two percent does not mean the wage pool entirely. Part of this 2 percent will become governmental income in the national budget, which in turn will be used to cover healthcare and social security costs. There will be these two components. In fact, 90 percent of the amount will go into the national budget to cover various destinations depending on outlay requests, and 10 percent will go into supporting all employees facing special situations in case the employer goes into insolvency and does not pay their dues," said Misa.
He added that it has been decided that it is better for the employer to pay some of employees' contributions and not to transfer them entirely to the employee so that the employer no longer has any responsibility. "The trade unions have drawn attention to this risk. The measure will be applied as from January 1, 2018. It is already being considered for approval. Its name will be contributions; the contributions will decrease, and so will the employer's expenses. Employers will not be affected by this computation and distribution. A redistribution of burden is performed between employees and employers, with one contribution to be serviced by the employers, but the contributions will still decrease overall," said Misa.
He also pointed out that the 2 percent would apply to all individual and legal taxpayers operating as public or private employers. "Today, if we talk about the percentage that goes to the Employee Guarantee Fund to ensure that the employees' contributions are paid if the employer goes bankrupt, it is 0.25 percent. In the future, it will become 0.2 percent," said Misa.
