Disabled people can lose the amount they can earn without reduced social security – the new government is asking for help.
Today, there are approximately 360,000 Norwegians who receive disability benefits due to permanent illness or injury. The goal of disability benefits is that these should be secured an income even if they can not work as much as before or work at all.
Today working one of four disabled, while the rest are out of work. Those who work can earn just over 42,000 kroner (0.4 G) before the disability benefit they receive from the state is reduced – a tax-free amount to be able to take on small positions and part-time jobs.
– The deductible is positive for me who is on disability benefits because it is indirectly a motivating factor to keep the head in vigor even if the body does not work. I do not have the ability to work again, but have some good days. I use them to write and get involved politically, says Else Birgitte Seker (49).
She sits as a deputy in the municipal council in Verdal for Rødt and as a co-judge in the district court. The commitments are small, and she is nowhere near earning 42,000 kroner a year. But the work and the salary make a big difference for her. Her self-esteem and self-esteem are strengthened when she gets the job, Seker says.
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Will remove the deductible
In the state budget that the Solberg government delivered before they were replaced by the Støre government three weeks ago, there are some sentences that made many people on disability benefits react:
From 1 January 2022, the Solberg government proposes to cut the free amount for people on disability benefits in favor of «halved reduction up to 1.2 G». In practice, this means that people on disability benefits can no longer make money without the disability benefit being reduced.
The proposal will reduce the state’s expenses for disability benefits and disability pensions by NOK 254 million, according to the proposal.
The proposal in the state budget 2022
Reorganization of the rules for reduction of disability benefits against earned income.
The government announced in Meld. St. 32 (2020–2021) that it would consider a reorganization of the current reduction rules in the disability scheme. The Government emphasizes strengthening the incentives for recipients of disability benefits with the opportunity to utilize a residual income capacity, by allowing disabled people with earned income to retain a larger part of the disability benefit for a longer income interval. From 1 January 2022, it is therefore proposed that the current deductible of 0.4 G be replaced by a halved reduction up to 1.2 G. It is proposed that the changes also apply to the statutory public occupational pension schemes and in the framework laws for private occupational pensions. The proposal entails a reduction in the costs of disability benefits from the National Insurance Scheme and disability pensions from the Government Pension Fund of NOK 254 million in 2022. To support the work incentives for people on disability benefits, the government also proposes to strengthen the right to aids for use in work.
(From proposal for state budget 2022, side 22):
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The proposal aroused resentment among people on disability benefits in the Facebook groups The Disability Uprising and the AAP campaign, and many demanded that the new government reverse the Solberg government’s proposal:
Elisabeth Thoresen, leader of the AAP campaign, writes, among other things, that she believes the threshold for working will be higher among the disabled as a result of the change:
Else Birgitte Seker is clear that she does not welcome the change, and hopes that the new government will reverse the proposal from the Solberg government.
– If it happens that the free amount is removed and that the social security is reduced for every kroner we earn, I will have to reconsider whether I can be elected and co-judge further, she says.
Whether the new government will change the proposal from the Solberg government is uncertain. In an e-mail to Nettavisen, the Labor Party’s communications manager Jarle Roheim Håkonsen writes the following:
– The Labor Party believes that better arrangements should be made for the disabled to be able to combine the benefit with work, but has not yet taken a position on the proposal from the previous government.
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– Removes the threshold
The proposal states that the deductible is replaced by a halved reduction of up to NOK 127,000 (1.2 G). The background for the Solberg government’s proposal was a recommendation from The Employment Committee who concluded that the current tax-free amount did not work optimally for two reasons:
One is that many disabled people stop working when they have earned 42,000 kroner and that the tax-free amount acts as a threshold that makes it less profitable to work more. The second is that only disabled people can prove that they will earn more than NOK 42,000 who are entitled to aids, says Henrik Asheim, parliamentary deputy leader of the Conservative parliamentary group.
A typical aid can be transport to work and facilitation at the workplace. With aids from the first krone, more people can combine disability benefits with work, work more and facilitate the transition to working life, Asheim hopes.
– Do you understand that people on disability benefits like Else Birgitte Seker, who earns well under 42,000 kroner a year, are skeptical of such a proposal?
– I understand that those who earn a good deal less than 42,000 annually will keep the deductible. At the same time, it will always pay more to work than not to work. And it will pay off even more for those who want to earn more than 42,000 kroner a year, says Asheim.
Requires action from the new government
On Monday, the new government will present its proposals for changes in next year’s state budget. Red politician Mímir Kristjánsson, who has been given a seat on the Storting’s Labor and Social Affairs Committee together with Conservative politician Asheim, has a clear message about the tax-free amount:
– What the Conservative government has done here has been hair-raising and petty, and it is a minimum requirement for the Labor Party and the Socialist People’s Party that they remove this cut. Actually, the deductible in the disability benefit should be increased, not lowered, says Kristjánsson.
He believes that many people on disability benefits will refuse to work if the tax-free amount disappears, and that the move by the Solberg government is the opposite of stimulating people to work. Kristjánsson believes that Red politician Else Birgitte Seker is a good example that the change will have a negative effect on the disabled at work.
– The tightening pushes insured people even further out of society. Now there is an end to the fact that the disabled can hold elected positions without losing social security from the very first krone. Why should a high-paid lawyer who works full time be allowed to keep the remuneration from municipal councils and city councils, while people on social security must share the money with NAV, Kristjánsson asks and continues:
– The result is that it becomes even worse for the disabled to participate in many arenas, and this is a group that participates far too little from before.
Conservative politician Asheim believes that Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre (Labor Party) is making a mistake by changing the proposal from the Solberg government.
– If the current government reverses this proposal, the current problems will continue – namely that fewer have the incentive to work more. In addition, they do not receive any aids if they do not envisage earning more than the current tax-free amount. In sum, the threshold for working as a disability benefit will be higher, says Asheim.
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