Nghe An: 3 subjects at risk of receiving low pensions

(Baonghean) - In recent days, the news that a kindergarten teacher in Ha Tinh province only received a salary of 1.3 million VND/month upon retirement has caused a stir among many people. A similar situation is happening to many kindergarten teachers in Nghe An due to the "historical" factor. In addition, there are thousands of other workers at risk of receiving low pensions because their employers do not comply with regulations on social insurance policies.

The pain of... pension

Last June, teacher Nguyen Thi Vy, a teacher at Nam Xuan Kindergarten (Nam Dan) officially retired. She thought this would be a time for her to be happy and comfortable after more than 30 years of working, but on the contrary, after retirement she lost 4kg. Talking about this "irony", she confided: "I retired, and when I got the decision from the Social Security agency, I found out that my pension was only 1.3 million VND/month. This amount is only 1/3 compared to when I was working, so how can I manage it?"

Checking employee records at Nam Dan District Social Insurance. Photo: My Ha

Ms. Vy started her career as a preschool teacher in 1980, when she was just 18 years old. At first, she worked in Tan Ky district, and only moved to Nam Dan in 1984. At that time, due to difficult economic and social conditions, the preschool teacher profession was still commonly called "child-rearing teacher" and the "salary" to pay teachers was calculated in paddy and rice paid by cooperatives.

The turning point for preschool teachers only began in 1995 - when the State had a policy for preschool teachers to be covered by insurance. However, it was not until 2011 that they were officially paid according to their salary scale after Nghe An had a policy to convert more than 500 semi-public preschools to public ones. Since then, she has received a salary increase every 3 years and the last salary scale she received before retiring was 3.96.

According to Mr. Le Thiet Hung - Director of Nam Dan District Social Insurance, Ms. Vy's case is not unique. Previously, in 2015, the whole district had 28 teachers born between 1955 and 1958 who were not eligible for retirement benefits. Nam Dan District had to provide funds to the Social Insurance agency to support part of the social insurance premiums and their retirement salaries were also very "low". At this time, there are 10 other teachers who are also being supported to raise their pensions to the same level as the basic salary (1,300,000 VND/month) after retirement.

Risk of low pensions "recurrence"

According to Mr. Le Truong Giang - Director of Nghe An Social Insurance: The retirement of preschool teachers with low salaries was predicted and partly due to historical characteristics. However, the alarming thing now is that there are still thousands of other subjects who are still working but are not paying social insurance according to regulations. The most obvious consequence is when they retire because insurance is the clearest reflection of the current salary situation.

Many preschool teachers are recruited into the state payroll when they are old, which affects their retirement benefits. Illustrative photo

To learn more about this issue, there are currently 3 main groups at risk of receiving low pensions after retirement. For teachers, in addition to preschool teachers (aged from 1970 and before and mainly in rural areas), there are thousands of primary and secondary school teachers who are contract teachers (contracted with districts and towns) and teachers in non-public schools.

These are teachers who have paid insurance but the payment level is only equal to or equal to the minimum wage. Through research at the provincial Social Insurance agency, most non-public kindergartens in Vinh city are currently maintaining the social insurance payment level for employees at 3,103,000 VND (regional minimum wage + 7%). In particular, there is a school called an international school, but the insurance payment level is very low (2,900,000 VND/month) even though the employee has worked for many years.

Regarding district contract teachers, many teachers have worked for 10-15 years, but districts still pay at salary levels of 1.86 (intermediate level), 2.1 (college level) and 2.34 (university level) and have not increased over the years. In Nam Dan district, the Director of the district Social Insurance said that the district currently has 71 teachers under district contracts and all are covered by insurance at very low salary levels. In fact, this salary level is currently not enough according to regulations because it is lower than the regional minimum wage. The district Social Insurance has also proposed this issue to local authorities, but due to budget difficulties, the contribution level for teachers has not been increased.

The second group that is at risk of having difficulty living on pensions is the part-time staff at the commune level. Currently, Nghe An has about 5,000 people who are full-time deputy heads at the commune level, such as Vice Presidents of associations, Deputy Secretary of the commune Youth Union, Deputy Chief of Commune Police, etc. These are cases that have not paid or only paid voluntary insurance before, and since 2016 have been switched to paying compulsory insurance.

However, the contribution level is only equal to the basic salary. The remaining subjects are about 60,000 employees (accounting for 30%) in non-state enterprises. According to Ms. Tran Thi Ha - Head of Collection Management Department - Nghe An Social Insurance:

According to Decree No. 49/2013/ND-CP of the Government, employers must pay insurance for employees based on salary + salary allowance + additional payments. However, currently, to reduce costs, many business owners only pay insurance for employees at the minimum wage. As for employees, because they only see immediate benefits (do not want to deduct insurance from monthly income), they do not demand benefits for themselves.

My Ha