Illustrative image (Photo: vov.vn) As of April this year, a total of 471 people receive a monthly pension of morethan 20 million VND (850 USD), said VSS. All of them worked in privatecompanies or foreign enterprises in Vietnam and had paid social insurance at ahigh level.
The man with the highest pension in the country, referred to as T. throughoutthis article, lives in HCM City.
Before retiring, T. was chairman of the members' council and general directorof a company operating in Vietnam.
T. retired in April 2015 with a pension of more than 87.3 million VND (3,700USD) per month.
After five adjustments of the State pension, by June this year, T.'s pension ismore than 124 million VND per month.
T. paid social insurance premiums for 23 years during the periodbefore 2007 when a person's salary was taken as the basis for socialinsurance payment, T.’s social insurance premium was very high.
There were times when T.’s average social insurance fee was more than 200million VND (8,500 USD) per month.
When the Law on Social Insurance 2006 came into effect, the maximum monthly feefor compulsory social insurance was equal to 20 months of the general minimumsalary. Accordingly, from January 2007 to March 2015, T. always paid socialinsurance premiums at the highest rate as prescribed, with an average salary of15.4-23 million VND (650-980 USD) per month.
Statistics last year showed that the average social insurance was 5.73million VND (240 USD) per month, equal to 76% of workers’ average income.
Foreign direct investment (FDI) enterprises have the highest social insurancepayment.
However, some enterprises separate or transfer allowances to other benefits sothat they do not have to pay social insurance.
Therefore, the social insurance is only slightly higher than the minimum wage.This payment makes the pension very low.
To improve the situation, the amended social insurance law has two options forlump-sum payments.
The first option allows the employee to receive full pay-out for the entireperiod of participating in social insurance and then would not be entitled to amonthly pension.
As per the second option, the employee would receive a lump-sum payment for atmost half of the period of contributions to the retirement and survivorshipallowance fund. The remaining period would be reserved forcalculating social insurance benefits when the employee reaches retirementage./.
VNA
