The debt to the Ecuadorian Institute of Social Security (IESS) that the government of Guillermo Lasso inherits from the new president Daniel Noboa would reach more than 10,000 million dollars, including the health debt that has been dragged on since 2006 and 40% for pensions, which has not been fully met since 2012 . years.

In addition, in 2023, the payment of about 646 million dollars to the IESS was stopped, according to the execution of the budget published by the Ministry of Economy and Finance. However, the amounts of the debt are not clear. The thing is that initially, in the general budget of the state, 2.118 million dollars was determined to pay 40% of pensions to social security. But in coding (recalculated) the budget was lowered to 1.981 million dollars. In this regard, it is expected that 1,474 million dollars (calculated) will be paid out for November, but only 832 million dollars were actually paid, that is, 646 million dollars are missing for payment.

In this sense, the new government gets a complex panorama of social security.

Henry Llanes, president of the Front for the new IESS, and Rubén Egas Peña, an expert on social security, agree that the million dollar debt exceeds 10,000 million dollars.

Thus, Egas Peña assures that the debt, without taxes, would reach 9446.2 million dollars. The medical debt alone is $4.9 billion. Furthermore, for a contribution of 40% of pensions, the state would owe the Ecuadorian Social Security Institute 3,543.7 million dollars. About 57.3 million dollars for professional risks, 569 million dollars for social insurance of peasants and 284 million dollars for refund of value added tax (VAT).

According to Egas Peña’s analysis, the medical debt arises from the care that IESS provides to people, which, according to the Law, must be covered by the state.

So:

The expert warns that the return that will be lost due to payment delay will exceed 2.8 billion dollars. He explains that the interest on that debt exceeds $1.1 billion. With these items, it exceeds the $10,000 million mark.

Meanwhile, Henry Llanes comments that the debt as of July 2023 is estimated at $10,051 million, according to calculations by IESS director Diego Salgado.

Llanes explains that the official figures released by the IESS will help him soon file an appeal to the Constitutional Court for non-compliance with the judgment against the branch minister, for non-compliance with the 40 percent payment.

For Llanes, the situation in the IESS is very serious if we take into account the warnings that the member of the IESS Board of Directors María de los Ángeles Rodríguez, representative of the employers, has already presented in the sense that if the obligations are not paid, there would be a risk of non-payment of pensions. In several communications he tells the Government that he would not have been able to transfer about $1.250 million for 40% and instead Biess invested $1.647 million. In this way, this year IESS financed 2.877 million dollars.

But what can the new government do about this hot potato?

Egas Peña states that in order to deal with the national debt according to the IESS, it is necessary:

For Llanes, what he has to do is set up a payment schedule that could take ten years to cover this huge debt. And until 2024, the budget must contain what really suits him. Llanes admits that this debt has become “practically unpayable.”

Meanwhile, the outgoing government noted that during its administration, efforts were made to pay the historic debt with the institution, including that of previous governments, and that more than $4.230 million was disbursed for this purpose from 2021 to 2023, which duly paid. earmarked for their specific purposes: pensions, $3,908 million, and health benefits, $322 million.