BAGUIO CITY – In a house resolution filed on January 7, Baguio City Lone District Representative Mark Go strongly urged the Social Security Commission to defer the implementation of the scheduled hike in Social Security System (SSS) contributions to ease the burden on Filipinos amid rising costs due to inflation.
Citing “wide clamor from all sectors,” House Resolution (HR) 2157 enjoined the commission to suspend its slated increase in the contribution rate to 15 per cent, which comes amid the Philippine Statistics Authority’s latest figure that inflation rose to 2.9 per cent in December from 2.5 per cent in November.
Rep. Go said that as the SSS’ policy body, the Social Security Commission should strongly consider the deferral of the hike in contributions “to provide our low-income earners a breathing space from the continued rising cost of commodities and services.”
Go also pointed out that the SSS’ revenue grew in 2023 by 15.6 per cent, from PhP353.82 billion to PhP306.16 billion in the previous year, adding that “the SSS can afford and manage to suspend the increase in contributions.”
He added that SSS earned a net income of PhP83.13 billion in 2023, exceeding its target of PhP51.06 billion for that year, according to a February report by the Philippine Daily Inquirer last year.
That same year, a Commission on Audit (COA) report revealed an inefficiency in the collection of premium contributions from delinquent employers, with only PhP4.581 billion collected – or 4.89 percent of expected collections in 2023 worth PhP93.747 billion.
“This is equivalent to PhP89.17 B of uncollected premium contributions from 420,627 employers,” he said.
Go added that the SSS’ inefficiency in collecting premium contributions based on the COA report “should first be addressed before the government insurance agency proceeds to implement the schedule of contribution rate hike.”
The Baguio solon also authored HR 253, which was adopted by the House of Representatives on September 25, successfully urging the Department of Health to issue Administrative Order 0017-2024 removing purchase slip booklet as a mandatory requirement for senior citizens to avail the 20% discount in the purchase of medicines. The administrative order was implemented on December 23.
