MADRID, 23 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The president of the Union of Professionals and Autonomous Workers (UPTA), Eduardo Abad, considers it “a priority” to include in the agenda of the new political course the extension of the subsidy for those over 52 years of age to the self-employed, excluded from this aid, and to achieve the modification of the decree before the end of 2022.
UPTA has already submitted its proposal to the Ministry of Labor and Social Economy and is waiting for the department led by Yolanda Díaz to decide to “fit” into this Royal Decree-Law workers over 52 years of age from the Special Scheme for Self-Employed Workers ( RETA), as Abad explained in statements to Europa Press.
The requirements that UPTA proposes are the same as those required for employed workers over 52 years of age, who have contributed to unemployment for at least six years throughout their working lives.
“These are the same conditions, so that there is no difference between the general regime and the RETA,” says Abad, who considers that this change in the decree would offer a “protective network” for the self-employed.
UPTA has already prepared its forecasts for the next four years and estimates that between 80,000 and 200,000 self-employed could close their businesses at the age of 52 without having access to this aid. Currently, he calculates that this figure would be around 25,000 self-employed workers.
“The self-employed, unfortunately, cannot take advantage of this subsidy because we do not meet the fundamental requirement, which is that you have to be registered as an employee for the last six years, an issue that a self-employed person obviously does not meet because he is registered in the RETA”, regrets Abad.
The most affected by the closure of their businesses after the age of 52 are the self-employed in commerce and hospitality, sectors in which a good part of the self-employed workers are over 50 years old. It is then that “a perverse situation” occurs, since their age makes it difficult for them to return to the labor market and, therefore, to contribute the remaining years to achieve their retirement.
“It is a critical age from the point of view of contribution careers and reintegration into the labor market”, adds the president of UPTA, without forgetting that the self-employed who are forced to close their projects do not usually leave the labor market ” in good conditions”.
Abad defends the need to give “a protective mattress” to those over 52 years of age and acknowledges that although it would involve an economic effort, “it is not crazy”, since “it is necessary”.
“Here I am also throwing a poisoned dart. We would like that if it were necessary to make a greater contribution effort so that there would be a higher level of cushion for those self-employed who unfortunately have to close, that it be done, that is not a problem”, emphasizes the President of UPTA.
Abad does not see any problems in this contribution effort either and considers that if the contribution system has been changed, with the recent reform, it is so that those who have the most, contribute the most, and it can be allocated to those who are “in complex and complicated situations “.
In addition, he rejects that the proposal to modify the decree wants to fall “into the subsidy” and clarifies that it must be a “temporary” aid while the self-employed recycle and requalify.
Abada hopes that the Government resolves this issue before the end of 2022, to avoid the “electoral race” next year and asks the different administrations to remember “the truly poor self-employed.”
