The Federation Council has expressed concern about retirement savings of the self-employed and proposed options for solving the problem, Vedomosti reports. Ekaterina Papchenkova, Director of the Center for Evidence-Based Expertise at the Gaidar Institute, believes that proposals put forward by senators are sensible.
The expert noted that many self-employed are actually employed, 46% (5.1 mn people) have no salary income and of these only 7% voluntarily participate in the mandatory pension insurance program
Senators have put forward a proposal to introduce into the Tax Code (TC) a system of fixed insurance payments for the self-employed, similar to the one that exists for individual entrepreneurs (IE). In line with this initiative, the total amount of annual contributions for pension and health insurance for the self-employed, according to Article 430 of the TC, will be Rb 53.658 in 2025, Rb 57.390 in 2026 and Rb 61.154 in 2027, provided that their annual income does not exceed Rb 300.000. If income exceeds this threshold, an additional pension contribution of 1% of the amount above the limit will be added to the fixed payments.
The second option is related to changes in the distribution of professional income tax (PIT). Currently, 63% of PIT is allocated to the regional budget and 37% to the Mandatory Health Insurance Fund. The senators' proposal is to revise these proportions with the aim of redirecting part of the funds to form future pensions of the self-employed.
According to Ekaterina Papchenkova, both options imply changing the PIT regime until the end of the experiment (end of 2028), which the authorities have previously promised to avoid. It would be more effective to oblige digital platforms that massively attract the self-employed to give preferences to performers who make pension contributions or allow them to pay these costs.
Image by Evgeny Razumny / Vedomosti