Unions to protest against rise in social insurance contributions

The National Confederation of Unions of Moldova (CNSM) has announced protests in response to a proposed 1 percentage point rise in the individual contribution of salary-earners to the budget of state social insurances. CNSM requests the Government not to allow an increase of the tax burden on employees, Info-Prim Neo reports. CNSM released a statement informing that during several meetings with the Government representatives it demanded that the social contribution level remained 23% for employers and 6% for employees. Nonetheless, in the draft 2013 budget of state social insurances, the Government proposes the contribution to be 7% for employees and 22% for employers. CNSM deems this a serious violation of the Law and of the principles of social partnership. The unions estimate that this redistribution would diminish the income of salary-earners by over 250 million lei. In the current situation, this would be a big blow to employees, especially to the one third of those employees whose salaries don’t even cover the minimum subsistence level, considering the decreasing wages and the rise in prices and fees. The unions insist that increasing the employees’ contribution to the budget of state social insurances is unacceptable as these contributions in Moldova are already twice higher than in some CIS countries.