Despite the relatively high overall employment rate in the Czech Republic of the population aged 20-64 (Czech Republic – 80.0%, Poland – 75.4%, Hungary – 78.8%, Slovakia – 74.6 %, EU – 73.1 %), there are still quite large groups of people in the Czech Republic with the opposite very low employment rates. These groups include (i) women caring for young children and relatives (ii) young workers, (iii) senior citizens, (iv) people with disabilities.
Based on the Czech goverment, in order to effectively support part-time work, among other measures, it is necessary to take into account given the dominant share of social security contributions in total labour taxation, to reduce social security contributions on the employer’s side. This measure is expected to naturally encourage employers to create and offer more part-time jobs.
The standard employer rate of social security is 24,8 % of the assessment base. It has been proposed to reduce the social security contributions paid by the employer by 5% under the following conditions:
- the employee’s agreed weekly working hours are between 8 and 30 hours (part-time).
- the employee’s assessment base does not exceed 1.5 times the average salary
- the employee belongs to one of the groups for which employment support is needed:
A. persons aged 55 years and over;
B. parents of children under 10 years of age or persons replacing parental care on the basis of the decision of the competent authority for children under 10 years of age;
C. persons caring for a close person who is dependent on the assistance of another person;
D. persons studying at secondary school or university;
E. persons with disabilities on the unprotected labour market;
F. persons in retraining
G. A reduction in premiums is also proposed for the group of persons under 21 years of age, regardless of the extent of the agreed working time.
The proposal has already been approved by the Senate. Now only the President’s signature is missing.