The pension system that IESS provides to its subsidiaries is in a critical situation, both its solvency and its financing. This is not only due to errors in the implementation and management of its resources, but mainly because, not understanding the reality of its problems, its administrators and actuarial technicians did not consider that one is the solvency of the pension scheme and the other is its liquidity. , omitting the demographic rate.

Although it is true that the liquidity of pension fund reserves has always been abused by dubious and unprofitable investments, also because previous governments have mostly taken from them, replacing them with bonds, as petty cash, to meet the needs of the national treasury, generating illiquidity that is accentuated by state neglect contribution of 40% to the pension fund, which caused the disinvestment of more than 8000 million dollars.

However, the problem, as explained by the interdisciplinary committee of the pension system reform project, is the extension of the life expectancy of pensioners and the population going into retirement, the increase in the informality of work, which makes it possible to omit membership and contributions; the fluctuations of the national and global economy that have affected it due to various factors, worsening until it reaches the deficit it faces.

According to IESS, the number of affiliates has grown from 2.7 million in 2012 to 3.2 million in 2021; that is, an increase of 19% or the equivalent of 536,812 associates. However, pensioners at IESS increased by 88 percent in the same period, from 309,811 in 2012 to 583,883 in 2021. When the previous negative balance occurred, the value obtained from eight contributors is five.

If there is an annual burden of 6,000 million dollars with a contribution of only 3,500 million from those branches that support this burden, there is no future for the pension fund, unless the various solutions proposed by the Commission provide the necessary support for the continuity of payments of current and future pensions.

Some of the formulas proposed by the Commission will be the subject of heavy debates in the social and political arena, especially those affecting the years of contributions required to retire and reducing the maximum future pensions. Compulsory social security membership by professionals, independents and traders would partly compensate for the current lack of members contributing to the pension fund.

Respecting the acquired rights, it determines the average value of the pension between the current base and the future ones that are determined for future retirees. There are other components that undoubtedly represent something new. Separation of the pension fund from the health care system. Delivery of the severance fund up to the time of retirement, including this value as an additional reserve fund for the old age pension.

The proposed formulas that the Commission has presented so far seem possible and, above all, essential for the survival of the pension fund. (OR)