The Ministry of Finance has classified a new stage of the pension reform

In the plan of draft legislation for 2021, published on the website of the Ministry of Finance, it is said that by December 15, 2021, it is planned to submit to the government a bill on a new voluntary funded pension system. As noted by the Interfax agency, this is a draft federal law that will provide for “the possibility of citizens forming additional sources of funding for retirement income from personal contributions in the non-state pension system with stimulating state support".

Seven years ago, in 2014, a moratorium was introduced on the formation of the funded part of the pension. The Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank then discussed several options for transforming compulsory pension insurance (CPI).

In the fall of 2019, developers unveiled plans to prepare a new voluntary funded scheme to replace the unavailable individual pension capital (IPC) called the “guaranteed pension plan” (GPP). The IPC was developed over three years - from 2016 to 2019. However, due to disagreements between the Central Bank and the ministries, as well as due to the great resonance on the issue of raising the retirement age, the PKI was never even sent for public discussion.

The GPP bill was then posted for public comment at the end of October 2019, but has remained at this stage so far. Among the main elements of the proposed scheme are a voluntary procedure for citizens to join the accumulation system, guaranteeing the safety of their long-term pension accumulations by the state, registering accumulation accounts by the central administrator, tax incentives for businesses and tax deductions for ordinary taxpayers.

During the discussion of the GPP, the Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance came up with a new idea of encouraging citizens to independently save for their retirement - an individual investment account of the third type (IIA-3). Such an initiative emerged in the past, 2020. This is a brokerage account or a trust account with tax benefits, but with a restriction on withdrawals and with preservation of benefits only after a certain period. In its concept, it resembles the parameters of the GPP.

According to the chairman of the Fair Russia party and the leader of the faction of the same name in the State Duma, Sergey Mironov, according to polls in social networks, 95% of Russians are against raising the retirement age. This indicates the anti-popular nature of the pension reform and the need for its early cancellation.