The Ministry of Labor will expand the right to a second allowance for families with children under 3 years old

Families will be able to receive regular payments from maternity capital for all children under 3 years old, regardless of the order of birth, provided that the income per family member is below two subsistence minimums (PM). If a family falls under the criteria for a comprehensive means assessment and already receives a single allowance from the budget, it will be able to issue two payments at the same time – up to two PM. This was reported to Vedomosti by a representative of the Ministry of Labor.

Such rules are already spelled out in the bill on a single allowance for families with children, which the State Duma adopted on Tuesday in the second and third readings. At the same time, families will have the right to use mother’s capital for these purposes after the adoption of amendments to the satellite law, which is now being prepared for the second reading, Yaroslav Nilov, chairman of the social policy committee, explained to Vedomosti. We are talking about amendments to certain legislative acts in connection with the adoption of the law “On universal benefits to citizens with children and pregnant women”, which have already passed the first reading. Now the right to a monthly payment from the mother’s capital is only for the second child, the bill provides for its use for the first, second, and third child, Nilov added.

The single allowance will combine five types of existing payments: a monthly payment to pregnant women, a child care allowance in case of temporary disability and in connection with motherhood, a monthly payment for children under 3, from 3 to 7 and from 8 to 17 years. The payment will be made at the expense of the federal and regional budgets, which will be transferred in the form of a subvention to the combined Pension and Social Insurance Fund (Sotsfond), created instead of the PFR and the FSS.

With the introduction of a single allowance, all families with children under 17 who meet the criteria for a comprehensive means assessment will be able to receive support from the budget, regardless of the child’s birth order, the representative of the Ministry of Labor added. Now, for example, assistance from the budget for children under 3 years old is provided only for the first children and in a number of regions – for the third or subsequent children.

The President instructed to work out mechanisms for positive motivation for the growth of their own labor incomes among families receiving benefits, the source added: families have grown, forming an increase, but not as significant as the child allowance, even in the minimum amount, ”explained a representative of the Ministry of Labor. Such mechanisms are currently being worked out, he added.

From 2023, 1.7 trillion rubles will be allocated annually for a single allowance, of which 1.4 trillion from the federal budget, and about 300 billion more from the funds of the regions, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said at a meeting with the president on support income of families with children. “Today, by creating this manual, we are practically completing work on this system [поддержки] and in the future we will only adjust it if any additional changes are required during the implementation,” Golikova noted. The amount of benefits will be 50, 75 or 100% of the regional PM, on average it is from 7,000 to 14,000 rubles. Minister of Labor and Social Protection of the Russian Federation Anton Kotyakov said at the meeting that the average maximum amount of such benefits would be 13,900 rubles. According to him, the new single allowance will cover families raising about 10 million children.

In those families where children were born or will be born before December 31, 2022, parents will be able to choose to receive benefits under the old rules or switch to the new rules.

The universal allowance will be assigned according to the principles of “social treasury” on the basis of an application submitted through a single portal of public services or through the MFC.

To receive payments, comprehensive means tests will be used, which take into account income (they must be less than the PM in the region per family member per month) and property (real estate, vehicles, deposits). At the same time, a family can own an apartment of less than 24 square meters. m per family member, a residential building with an area of ​​less than 40 sq. m per family member, garage, land plot: for urban residents – no more than 0.25 ha, for rural residents – no more than 1 ha, as well as one car or motorcycle, one unit of agricultural machinery, one boat or motor boat. In addition, a mandatory condition for the availability of earnings is introduced – the so-called zero income rule, when parents cannot receive a payment if they do not work for no objective reasons (including caring for children in a large family, for a child under 3 years old, registering as unemployed) . The previous criteria for receiving benefits up to 3 years took into account only the amount of income – no more than two PMS per family member during the year. The amount of the payment was set at the level of the PM in the region. Allowances for children from 3 to 7 and from 8 to 17 years old were immediately assigned taking into account the new criteria of need.

The average per capita income of a family for receiving a single allowance is calculated based on the sum of the incomes of all family members for the last 12 calendar months preceding the month before the application was submitted.

The key change in the system of benefits for families with children is the coverage of the support measure for all families, regardless of the age of the children, says Lilia Ovcharova, Vice-Rector, Director of the HSE Institute for Social Policy. In addition, now funds are allocated from the federal budget with co-financing from the regional ones, which means that the subject must comply with the federal framework, but it can add its own regional features, the expert adds. According to Ovcharova, if the region does not apply for help from the federal budget, then it pays them as it sees fit – this is probably the way Moscow will go.

The unified allowance has a number of advantages, one of which is the redistribution of the financial burden from the regions to the federal center, notes Alexander Safonov, Vice-Rector of the Financial University under the government. Now the regions that have low budget security are forced in the context of multi-purpose tasks to formulate a policy depending on the availability of resources and goal-setting, he adds: having two or three children. As a result, some families dropped out of the shortlist, and the subject could not provide real support.” The introduction of a universal allowance implies unified approaches based on the principle of need, and not social status, the expert emphasizes. The second important change is the introduction of the “social treasury” principle, when the calculation of income is based on aggregated data from the PFR and the Federal Tax Service, that is, there is no need to collect documents, Safonov emphasizes.

Since several benefits are combined at once, where different rules apply (for example, for children under 3 years old, the criteria are different), the law provides for a transitional period, Ovcharova notes: until a child reaches 3 years old, a family can receive benefits according to the old rules, but families with children, born from January 1, 2023, will make payments for new ones. If a family has a child under 3 years old and its income is in the range of one to two PM, it is more profitable to stay on the old rules, the expert notes.

The current state policy increases the targeting of support measures, which will positively affect the level of poverty in the country, while benefits do not fundamentally solve the problem, says Victoria Pavlyushina, head of the Economics and Social Development Department of the Center for Social Development. The targeting will be increased, among other things, by changing the procedure for assigning social payments – new criteria, a three-stage amount of payments, she adds.

According to Safonov, the other side of the coin is that some families that received benefits based on status, such as those with many children, are deprived of this right. From the point of view of having many children, this is a bad sign, because the family should not go below the poverty line due to the birth of subsequent children, he adds. About 20-25% of families fall out of the loop of support measures in accordance with the zero income rule, but there is a social contract for them, i.e. job search through the employment center, reminds Ovcharova. “But this is fair – the allowance should not put families who work at a disadvantage, otherwise labor demotivation sets in,” emphasizes Ovcharova.

The ability to use maternity capital for benefits prioritizes spending on current consumption, rather than investing in the future of the child or improving housing conditions, which casts doubt on the original purpose of this payment – to encourage families to have a second child, Safonov said.