AMMAN — Proposed amendments to the Social Security
Law aim to ensure all workers, their families and retirees are protected, and
guarantee the system’s financial sustainability, said Hazem Al-Rahahleh,
director general of the
Social Security Corporation (SSC), according to Al
Ghad.
اضافة اعلان
“The Social Security Corporation has started taking steps
and procedures to include all the workforce under its umbrella, to provide the
necessary means of protection for workers and family members, and for all
members of society,” Rahahleh said while addressing the board of the Jordan
Chamber of Commerce Tuesday.
He said the SSC was created to provide social protection for
every worker in the Kingdom without regard to gender or nationality.
The amendment allows for the lowering of companies’ SSC
contributions across a wider segment and all age groups, in the event economic
growth slows in the Kingdom. The aim being to stimulate the economy.
Rahahleh said the amendment enhances insurance benefits
provided by the SSC and will impact subscribers and retirees positively. He said
that the proposed amendments will also ensure financial sustainability of
programs, incentivization of companies, responsiveness to and protection for
subscribers.
The amendment focused on raising the early retirement age to
55 for men and 52 for women. This amendment will not include those whose
service exceeds 10 years, or 120 contributions as off January 1, 2022.
He pointed out that the proposed amendment abolished early
retirement for those whose contributions by January 1, 2025 are less than 36
contributions, noting that early retirement has become a challenge for the SSC
and has become the norm in the country, while retirement at old age is the
exception.
To incentivize private sector companies, the amendment would
allow them to partially include workers under the age of thirty in old-age pension
programs, which would result in a reduction in the percentage of contributions
employers pay from 21.75 percent to 13.5 percent.
Rahahleh said that companies can include workers under 30 in
full or partial cover. In the event of partial coverage, 50 percent of a
worker’s old-age pension is calculated, provided the worker’s rights in
coverage for work injuries, maternity, unemployment, disability and death, are preserved
in full.
He said the proposed amendment to the law would include
amending the annual inflation increase to be calculated according to the
average rate of inflation and the rate of growth in wages, which would result
in a higher increase than the current law on retirees' salaries permits.
It will also link early retirement salaries to the annual
increase in inflation, so that it is inversely related to wages. The full
annual increase is granted on salaries that are under JD300, 75 percent of the
annual increase is granted on salaries between JD300 to JD500, while 50 percent
of the annual increase on salaries is granted on salaries between JD500 and
JD1000. Early retirement salaries that exceed JD1,000 are linked to inflation
at the time when the subscriber reaches the compulsory retirement age.
The SSC recently proposed to the Council of Ministers,
extending the “Estidama” and “Estidama Plus” programs until the end of June
2022, Rahahlah said.
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