Jordan Labor Watch – Morad Kotkot
As soon as the Social Security Corporation (SSC) announced, in mid-October, the suspension of all beneficiary applications for the Estidama++ program for establishments with 10 workers or fewer—announcing that the target number of beneficiaries for the first phase had been reached—questions began to arise regarding its effectiveness.
As the SSC explained, at the time, that the number of workers covered by the program, which exempts workers from social security contributions for 18 months and provides cash support in the form of three-monthly installments, had reached 13,000—the target number for the first phase.
Social protection and insurance expert Moussa Al-Subaihi says this number is very small considering the size of the workforce in target sectors, which number in the hundreds of thousands—not to mention the sectors not covered by the program.
According to a World Bank report on employment in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, issued last June, 59 percent of all work in Jordan is unregulated.
Speaking to Labor Watch, Al-Subaihi said the program should be expanded to cover additional sectors, such as construction, which employs tens of thousands of workers and where there is high incidence of workplace injuries.
The duration of the social security contribution subsidy is also not enough to enable workers to begin paying them on their own at the of the program, according to Al-Subaihi, who estimates that contributions should be subsidized for no less than three years.
Hamada Abu Nijmeh, director of the Workers' House, stated that the provision of such support is in line with the institution’s essential purpose and should be expanded to include additional beneficiaries, joining Al-Subaihi in pointing out that the program did not cover all unregulated sectors in the Kingdom.
Abu Nijmeh believes that such programs should be sustainable until the worker reaches old age, without prejudice to the insurances provided by the institution.
Lastly, Abu Nijmeh pointed out that promoting social security inclusion might be better achieved by reducing contributions in proportion to workers’ wages, as opposed to subsidizing their wages—as in the Estidama++ program—cautioning that ensuring or supporting the payment of wages is not a responsibility of the SSC.