Annual growth of social pensions
The traditional annual increase in social pensions in Russia will take place from April 1, 2021. Pensions and benefits will be indexed by 2%. The corresponding government decree was signed by Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev .
“To approve the indexation coefficient of social pensions from April 1, 2019 in the amount of 1.02,” says the document published on the official portal of legal information.
The corresponding instruction was given to the Pension Fund of Russia (PFR), which will inform its territorial bodies about the decision.
Legal information portal /
Pension increase in 2021
The Russian Pension Fund has decided to index pensions and benefits in stages. Already on January 1, 2021, payments were raised by 7.05%, which is more than the inflation rate. It affected insurance pensions for old age, length of service or disability of non-working pensioners.
The February indexation with a coefficient of 3.4 will affect single cash payments: for example, funeral benefits. In April, an increase in social and government payments of 2.4% will be introduced. Payments to working pensioners will be reviewed in August. In October, military pensions will increase by almost 6%, but not all of them: indexation of the second pension for military pensioners is not provided.
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Who is entitled to a double bonus from January 1
In January, the fixed supplement to the old-age and disability insurance pension was increased. After indexation, it became 5334.19 rubles. The pension supplement for rural residents will increase by 25% from 2021. The size of the payment, previously called the basic one, does not depend on the amount of insurance contributions; it is assigned by the state in accordance with its type and category of pensioners. The increased bonus is received by:
- Persons over 80 years old, disabled people of group I.
- Russians with dependent disabled family members.
- People who have worked in the Far North and equivalent regions for more than 15 years, with insurance experience for men of at least 25 years, for women more than 20 years, regardless of place of residence.
- Resident of a rural area, who devoted more than thirty years to agriculture, at the time of retirement, did not work, were not engaged in entrepreneurship.
The Ministry of Labor reminded about the indexation rules
The Ministry of Labor of the Russian Federation recalled that indexation of social pensions is carried out annually, taking into account the growth rate of the pensioner’s cost of living over the past year. Based on data on the size of the living wage of a pensioner in the Russian Federation for 2021 (8,483 rubles) and for 2017 (8,315 rubles), the growth rate of the living wage of a pensioner in Russia for 2021 amounted to 102%.
“In this regard, it is proposed to index the size of social pensions by 2% from April 1, 2021,” the Russian Ministry of Labor said in a statement.
Features of receiving social funds
The social pension is intended for:
- pensioners who have not earned insurance coverage;
- disabled people;
- upon loss of a breadwinner;
- other cases.
Important: for pensioners, after the end of the reform, the social pension will be available to women at 68 years old, and to men at 70 years old.
In 2021, it will be accrued at 65.5 years / 60 years for men / women, only if the corresponding length of service has not been achieved or circumstances for accrual arise.
Russia plans to double the social tax deduction – more information can be found here.
The current pension amount for various categories of citizens is as follows:
- for small nationalities of the North - 5,180.24 rubles;
- disabled people of the 1st group since childhood and disabled children - 12,432.44 rubles;
- orphans before completing their studies, disabled people of group 1, disabled children of group 2 – 10,360.52 rubles;
- disabled people of group 3 – 4,403.24 rubles.
In which months in 2021 the pension will be increased you can find out in this video:
To apply for a social pension you must:
- pensioner's application;
- an identity document that can be used to determine the applicant’s age and citizenship;
- documents confirming place of residence;
- documents of the representative, if he acts on behalf of the future recipient.
Important: in addition, documents are required based on the case of application, indicating the applicant’s status, for example, a pensioner who does not have the minimum length of service to receive an insurance pension or an orphan.
State Duma plans
As the State Duma assures, starting from 2021, social payments will increase by 4%, since the inflation rate this year, which is the target for increasing payments, was 4.4%. However, these are only assumptions by deputies, while plans regarding the size of the pension increase are different.
Here you will find out what social guarantees are provided to people of pre-retirement age according to the law.
In total, according to forecasts, the growth of social payments in the period from 2019 to 2021 will be 9%, according to the following schedule:
- 2019 – 2.4%
- 2020 – 3.9%
- 2021 – 2.7%
Important: indexation will occur on April 1 annually based on the pensioner’s cost of living for the previous period.
What do they say about the promotion in the State Duma?
At the same time, this amount of increase in social benefits is significantly less than it was in 2021 and in monetary terms it will be 163 rubles.
Over the past few years, social pensions have practically not grown, since their increase, unlike insurance ones, the growth of which depends on inflation, depends on the growth index of the cost of living.
How much will the average social pension increase?
The average social pension will increase to 9,266 rubles.
The average pension for disabled children will increase to 13,674 rubles on average, and for group I disabled children since childhood - to 13,812 rubles.
The average disability pension for conscripts will increase to 12,899 rubles, and for the loss of a breadwinner for the families of conscripts - to 10,942 rubles.
The average pension for disabled people due to war injury will reach 31.3 thousand rubles, for participants in the Great Patriotic War - 37.4 thousand rubles.
Who else will be affected by the indexation of pensions from April 1
Pensions for military personnel and members of their families will also be increased; citizens awarded the badge “Resident of besieged Leningrad”; persons affected by radiation or man-made disasters and members of their families. The bonus will apply to flight test personnel, long-service pension accruals for cosmonauts and members of their families, as well as payments to some other categories of citizens. Indexation will be carried out based on the corresponding amounts of social pensions. More accurate data for each category of social pension recipients can be found on specialized websites, for example, Pensiology.ru.
Will there be a second indexation of pensions?
When discussing the issue of increasing pension payments, there were rumors that a second indexation of pensions was expected in 2021. The text of the law states that the government does not provide for a second indexation of pensions for non-working pensioners. Citizens were misled by the gradual increase in social, state, military pensions and various additional payments.
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Increasing social benefits
On February 1, 2021, it is planned to increase the amount of some social benefits, additional payments and compensations by 3.4%. There are a number of payments, the indexation of which, according to Russian legislation, is made once a year and depends on the actual increase in prices for goods and services:
- EDV received by Heroes of the USSR and Russia, war veterans, Chernobyl victims, families with children;
- funeral allowance;
- for temporary disability;
- on unemployment;
- set of social services.
State and social pensions
On April 1, 2021, legislation plans to increase state pension payments paid by the state from the federal budget to certain categories of citizens:
- The state pension for long service is awarded to federal civil servants, cosmonauts, and test pilots.
- State old age pension is awarded to victims of man-made disasters.
- State disability benefits are intended to compensate for damage to health caused during military service as a result of radiation and man-made disasters caused by disability.
- The state survivor's pension is awarded to disabled family members of deceased military personnel, astronauts, and persons who participated in eliminating the consequences of man-made and radiation disasters.
- Social pensions are calculated as assistance to low-income Russians in the absence of other sources of income.
The social pension indexation coefficient is 2.4. After the increase, this monthly payment will reach 5304.57 rubles. This is much less than the cost of living. To avoid violation of the law, the Pension Fund of the Russian Federation will make an additional payment to all recipients of social pensions up to the regional subsistence level.
In 2021, the average social pension in Russia will be 9,215 rubles.
Will social pensions be indexed for other categories of pensioners?
Let us remind you that the State Duma adopted the first reading of a bill changing the procedure for calculating pensions for low-income pensioners. Previously, as part of the pension reform, pensioners' pensions from 2021 were indexed by 7%, which amounted to an average of one thousand rubles. However, due to the fact that according to the law it was impossible to pay an amount exceeding the minimum subsistence level of a pensioner, citizens have not yet received this increase.
The new law provides for a change in the principle of calculating pensions for low-income pensioners. The recalculation will be made before July 1, 2019, affecting 12% of non-working pensioners. An additional 120 billion rubles will be budgeted for this in 2019-2024.
Instructions regarding the recalculation of pensions were made in the message of Russian President Vladimir Putin to the Federal Assembly. In his message, Putin also outlined measures that need to be taken to support families.
Social pensions in April 2021 will increase less than planned
So far, the published document is only a draft Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation, which theoretically may change. However, in practice this is unlikely to happen, since formally the Ministry of Labor has calculated the percentage of indexation of social pensions in 2021 according to all the rules.
The project assumes that the percentage of indexation of social pensions in April will be exactly 2%. The budget of the Russian Pension Fund for 2019 included a higher percentage - 2.4%. Recipients of this type of pension will receive a smaller increase than was promised before the beginning of this year.
It's all about the procedure for calculating the percentage for indexation of social pensions in Russia.
Such pensions are increased not based on how prices rise due to inflation, but based on the increase in the cost of living. Paradoxically, the cost of living according to Rosstat may grow more slowly than consumer prices. That's what happened this time.
The cost of living for a pensioner in 2021 turned out to be exactly two percent higher than in 2021 - 8,483 rubles versus 8,315 rubles.
On average, the Russian social pension will increase by 182 rubles and reach the level of 9.2 thousand rubles per month.
