Small and medium businesses could face huge cost of social insurance

The calm of the holiday period is being rudely broken by a return to the battle over the Hausner plan. The government has smoothed its savings suggestions but the opposition wants to reject the bill anyway. Just before the holidays the government decided to make some improvements in its own bills. From the very first project only a few points remain: the sick leaves reform, new principles of combining pensions with work and the controversial idea of raising the value of social insurance contribution for entrepreneurs. The government's argument is that businessmen also have to pay for the costs of the reform. Higher contributions would provide the budget with zł.8 billion in the years 2005-2008. According to entrepreneurs they would cause small and medium companies' bankruptcy. It is still uncertain if the votes of the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) and the Labor Party (UP) will be enough to save even this version of the bill from the opposition. (Gazeta Wyborcza, p. 1) A.F.