Tiếng Việt
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The draft of the Social Insurance Law proposes allowing workers to pay the overdue social insurance contributions owed by their employers, ensuring they meet the conditions to receive benefits. This measure aims to protect workers’ rights in cases where the employer is unable to pay social insurance, such as due to bankruptcy, dissolution, or absconding.
If workers exercise this right, the Social Insurance Agency will temporarily acknowledge the contribution period, allowing them to qualify for social insurance benefits like pensions and unemployment benefits. Once the enterprise pays the overdue amount, this period will be recalculated.
However, some representatives have expressed concerns about forcing workers to cover contributions to receive benefits lost due to their employers’ failure to meet social insurance obligations. They note that this could cause frustration and distrust among workers, who would have to pay additional money to cover the employer’s non-compliance.
Calculations indicate that for each month an employer fails to fully contribute to social insurance, workers opting to cover the amount would have to pay over 40% of their monthly salary into the fund. This includes the 10.5% initially deducted from their salary but not paid by the employer, an additional 10.5% from the worker, and 21.5% from the employer.
Thus, under this compensation plan, workers would have to allocate over 40% of their monthly salary to cover the employer’s fault. This proposal has been immediately opposed by workers and parliamentary representatives.
Employer evasion or delays in paying social insurance significantly impact workers’ rights. Besides reducing pension entitlements and disqualifying them from unemployment benefits, workers may face issues such as unresolved pension records, inability to transfer social insurance when switching jobs, invalidated health insurance cards, and card deactivation 30 days after the employer stops contributing to social insurance.
Conversely, workers have no means to protect their rights other than suing the employer. However, the initial time and costs must be borne by the workers, with uncertain outcomes, especially given many businesses’ dissolution, bankruptcy declarations, or leadership fleeing abroad.
Notably, this proposal also risks incentivizing employers to delay or evade contributions, knowing that workers would cover the unpaid amounts.
Despite widespread opposition, some workers believe the proposal could assist them rather than increase their burden. For instance, some workers with the means to cover unpaid contributions currently cannot do so due to existing regulations. Allowing workers to pay the unpaid contributions would enable them to increase their pension benefits and complete their records for other entitlements.
Furthermore, given that many delinquent employers are entirely unable to pay, allowing workers to cover the contributions is reasonable as they cannot compel the employer to pay.
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