El Gobierno aprueba el nuevo sistema de cotización para los trabajadores autónomos basado en los rendimientos netos

The Government today approved in the Council of Ministers the Royal Decree-Law establishing a new system of contributions for self-employed workers, based on net returns.

This reform, which will be effective in 2023, is the result of the agreement reached by the Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration, with the social partners CEOE, Cepyme, CCOO and UGT, and with the autonomous organizations ATA, UATAE and UPTA.

This reform complies with the recommendations of the Toledo Pact, which were approved by the plenary of the Congress almost unanimously, and the tripartite social agreement of July 1 signed by the Government and the social partners. It is also a commitment contained in the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan within component 30.

New system

First, the reform establishes that in the next three years a system of fifteen tranches is progressively deployed that determines the contribution bases and quotas based on the net returns of the self-employed, as a transition to the definitive model of contributions for real income that will occur at the latest in nine years.

In addition, the concept of net returns is defined, which is fundamental for the implementation of the new system. In this way, the net returns will be calculated by deducting from the income all the expenses produced in the exercise of the activity and necessary to obtain income from the self-employed. On that amount, a deduction for generic expenses of 7% (3% for self-employed companies) is additionally applied. The result will be the net returns and that will be the figure that will determine the basis of the quotation and the corresponding quota.

This enables a system that allows the self-employed to change their quota based on their net income forecast (discounting the costs of carrying out their activity) up to six times a year. At the end of the fiscal year and once the annual net returns are known, the contributions will be regularized, returning or claiming quotas in case the stretch of definitive net returns is below or above that indicated by the forecasts during the year. Monthly social security contributions will range from 230 euros per month to 500 euros per month in 2023 and from 200 euros per month to 590 euros per month in 2025, always depending on net returns.

In percentage terms, the self-employed with the lowest incomes will experience a reduction in their quota of more than 30% compared to the current one. Self-employed workers with returns below the SMI, among whom there are many young people and women, will pay contributions between 200 and 260 euros per month in 2025. That year, the average performance tranches will have quotas between 290 and 294 euros per month and those who earn more than 6,000 euros per month, 590 euros.

The text approved today also sets a bonus quota for new self-employed people of 80 euros for twelve months, extendable to an additional twelve months when net income remains low.

The text also includes a periodic evaluation of this new system, which will be carried out within the framework of the social dialogue every three years.

Detail of the bases and quotas by sections

Protective action

In addition, the reform includes a significant improvement in the scheme of protection for the cessation of activity of self-employed workers. Based on the experience of the deployment of benefits during the pandemic and the eruption of the volcano Cumbre Vieja de La Palma, the modalities of the cessation of activity are extended to improve the coverage of different contingencies, as in the case of a only partial interruption of activity, and the protection provided to employees by the RED mechanism established in the labor reform for cyclical or sectoral crisis situations is adapted to the self-employed.

New protection scheme

Update of the aid for those affected by the Toxic Oil Syndrome

The Council of Ministers also approved on Tuesday an institutional declaration of support and recognition for those affected by the Toxic Oil Syndrome, which affected thousands of people by mass poisoning as a result of intoxication derived from the consumption of rapeseed oil adulterated with aniline, in 1981.

The statement proclaims that the government wants this syndrome “not to be forgotten by institutions or society” and commits to “continue to accompany and help all affected people.” In this sense, the text refers to the aid that was put in place to support the victims and asserts that “the evolution of the protective action granted to this group, the extensive jurisprudence dictated and the time elapsed, make it necessary to update the amounts of this aid”.

To materialize this commitment, the declaration states that in the coming days “an Order of the Ministry of Inclusion, Social Security and Migration will be published in which the economic amounts that have been allocated per family unit are substantially reviewed, adapting them to the current social and economic reality, both of the complementary family economic aid and of the home help in favor of those affected by the toxic syndrome.”