Budget spending on monthly allowances for families with children may grow by 35% in the next two years

Federal budget expenditures on monthly allowances in connection with the birth and upbringing of a child will increase by an average of 35% in 2024 and 2025 compared to 2023, follows from the Social Fund’s projections for 2024–2026, which are available Vedomosti. According to the document, 1.61 trillion rubles will be allocated for payments in 2024, 1.72 trillion rubles in 2025, and 1.86 trillion rubles in 2025. The Social Fund confirmed the increase in funding to the publication.

In addition, the projections indicate that the expenditures of the budgets of the regions of Russia for these purposes will also increase. So, in 2024, the subjects will allocate 363.9 billion rubles for benefits. (43% more than in the current budget), in 2025 – 392.8 billion rubles. (+41%), and in 2026 – 422.9 billion rubles.

Thus, the total federal budget expenditures for the payment of monthly benefits in 2024 will amount to 1.975 trillion rubles, in 2025 – 2.117 trillion rubles. and in 2026 – 2.280 trillion rubles. As Minister of Labor and Social Protection Anton Kotyakov said earlier, in 2023, 1.7 trillion rubles were allocated from the budget for the payment of benefits.

The Social Fund explained that the increase in expenses for this type of payments is associated with an increase in the subsistence minimum and the transition to a single allowance.

The Unified Benefit is a measure of social support for parents and pregnant women, which, from January 1, 2023, has combined the old social payments for children. From 2024, the authorities want to replace with a single allowance all monthly payments that are assigned to families with children under 17 years old inclusive.

The allowance will be paid after a comprehensive assessment of the income and property of the family, which is counting on social assistance. Because of this, those who receive old payments may now lose them when switching to a single allowance. 2023 is a transitional year, and therefore families can either leave the old payments or switch to a new single benefit (if, for example, its size is larger than the size of the old social payments). All old payments will remain until the date for which they were assigned, but it will no longer be possible to extend them.

For more information about the amount of the single allowance, how to apply for it and what family incomes are taken into account – in material “b”.

Erdni Kagaltynov