The first point that concerns us is the pension reform. The cost of social charges is excessive: about 50% of the salary. This fact causes the labor cost to be treated tremendously, the worker receives much less income and the compensation consequences are aggravated, Because the compensation calculations do not go on the net that the worker charges, but they go on the gross, and in the brute are the social burdens, something that the worker never received in hand. Not only unnecessarily aggravates the compensation cost, but also makes the employer think twice before hiring. What benefits would change the equation? If the worker received the total salary, he would improve his contributory capacity from the worker and his purchasing power, which would impact consumption. This, instead of contributing to a solidarity box, which does not even guarantee a good retirement for the current passive class.
Our pension regime is deficit. What our retirees charge does not compose a decent salary. However, the labor cost to support this deficient pension regime is very high. It is a solidarity pension regime, that is, it is the current active class that supports the current passive class, which generates a serious inconvenience. When there is a capitalization regime, the old AFJP regime, what each one contributed, as a pension regime, went to an own capitalization account: each one was charging from its own capitalization. That is, the worker said “well, if they ultimately impose high social loads, it is` silver that I do not see today, but it goes for my own capitalization account. “ Which, several could say, this does not make much sense because ultimately why I have to compulsively contribute to a future retirement and that is given another. Although it is an almost philosophical issue, it is a topic to think.
Specifically, the pension reform will contribute to social burdens and optimize the Argentine labor system. The active class workers will receive more net money in hand, the costs will be reduced and in parallel the active worker will know that what he is contributing will be for his future and the construction of his own future. The problem will be how to solve the livelihood of the current passive class. And another topic arises: having little employment registered in white, the contributions and contributions to the distribution pension system, do not reach a broader retirement for the current passive class. It is a vicious circle: we are in the presence of a lousy pension regime, in a context of little blank employment, so the salary cuts suffered by the labor cost, but the passive class receives little money. So today, I look at it where I look at it, the system is completely harmful. It merits an urgent reform.
The second topic to be addressed for labor modernization is the work cessation fund. It is already provided in the reform that the Government of Milei introduced through the Decree and after the Base Law, where it is expected that, by collective labor agreement, compensation for dismissal is eliminated and a fund of cessation similar to that used by UOCRA is created. The reality is that this cessation fund, although it is currently planned to be subject to agreement regulation, it is recommended that there be a cessation fund in a mandatory way and, if you want, universal. Or also by agreement, but not to be fought to the negotiation of the unions: it has to be by law. Compensation for dismissal is eliminated and supplanted by cease -fund system, as it currently exists in the construction industry. This would throw the ground with the millionaire industry of the judgments, which have lessen a lot from the cut of the fines of the Employment Law. As data, it is worth it that in the construction industry labor conflict is much lower than in other industries, so that this would be a very important step to expedite the Argentine labor regime.
For the worker, a regime of this nature is much more effective: he does not have to wait for a 4 -year trial to collect compensation. On the contrary, the day that is fired, the immediate business month is already receiving contributions from the cessation fund. And then he returns to work, stop receiving those contributions and contributes again to the cessation fund regime for those who are fired can collect from there. It is a regime, which, in fact, has proven to function very well.
The last point, also in order to improve the Argentine labor regime, and avoiding the trial industry, the issue of the interest rate at the national level must be regulated: it is not possible that in labor matters each jurisdiction decides what is the applicable interest rate, and above it is resolved by the labor chamber itself. Judges cannot create laws and, ultimately, when they agree on interest rates, they are creating specific laws. Laws that are called agreed and that the Court has declared them unconstitutional on one occasion, in two, in three, and systematically the Chamber insist again. So, we must bear in mind that today, the most serious problem of the labor trial industry is precisely in the computation of interests and the capitalization of the interests and applications of coefficients decided by the cameras. One of the problems was eliminated, which were those of the fines, but this issue of interest is the main problem in terms of labor litigation and nonsense that it represents in economic terms.
That said, this point has to be resolved with a national scope standard that defines the applicable interest rate. This could be perfectly assimilated at the applicable rate for civil issues or for commercial issues, for example. Why should a different rate set? That would eliminate many conflicts and reduce the costs of labor justice and the trial industry.
* Alejandro López Tilli is an expert lawyer in SMEs and family businesses
By Alejandro López Tilli
