Youth First Job: The State Pays for AMO and Pension Contributions
30 June 2011
Read by 2535 persons
In addition to these measures, there are other incentives under the training/integration contract. A professional integration contract has just been established: a 20,000 DH allowance paid to the company for each permanent contract signed.
The government wants to boost employment - particularly for young graduates - as it committed to in the social agreement of April 26, and, in this sense, an agreement was recently signed with the General Confederation of Moroccan Enterprises (CGEM).
Two "urgent" measures have been decided in this agreement. The first concerns the improvement of the training/insertion contract called the Idmaj contract. This improvement, according to sources at the National Agency for the Promotion of Employment and Skills (ANAPEC, manager of the system), consists in granting the beneficiaries of the Idmaj contract full social coverage: health and pension insurance. In a way, this is the Achilles' heel of the training/insertion contract, as the program's monitoring and evaluation surveys also point out.
The employer's share of these contributions for health and pension insurance will be covered by the government instead of the company, but on condition that the company enters into an indefinite contract (CDI) with the trainee. The period of social contribution coverage by the state is one year.
According to ANAPEC estimates, this measure will cost the state 200 MDH. It will be in addition to the bonuses already granted to the company since the implementation of this system in 2006: exemption from income tax and professional tax for 24 months, extended by 12 months in the case of a common law contract (CDI). But given the low level of salaries paid by companies to beneficiaries of Idmaj contracts (80% do not exceed 2,500 DH per month), the income tax exemption is therefore granted automatically. In other words, only 20% of contracts exceed 2,500 DH per month, of which barely 3% reach 6,000 DH, and therefore are subject to exemption under the contract. This also explains, incidentally, the...modesty of the tax cost of this measure: 20 million DH per year. And this can also explain the "success" of this system whose tax carrot, it should be recalled, has been extended in the current Finance Act until the end of 2012 (for another 2 years).
According to ANAPEC data, the training/insertion contract benefited, between 2006 and 2010, some 200,000 people, at an average of 40,000 per year. About 80% of these beneficiaries were recruited permanently either in the company where they did their internship, or in another company (which probably offered them a higher salary).
The integration contract targets university graduates with a Bac+4 and above
The second measure decided in the agreement by the government and the CGEM concerns the professional integration of young graduates in difficulty. The system that will be put in place is called the "Professional Integration Contract" (CIP). The target: young people who are difficult to integrate and who are mainly university graduates (Bac + 4, DES, etc.). These young graduates will be supported in the company as part of an integration plan; they will benefit from training and supervision, with a tutor, for 6 to 9 months. The state's contribution, at this level, will consist of covering training costs and, if this training leads to a CDI, paying the company an allowance of 20,000 DH per beneficiary of the CDI.
Very clearly, the government, in collaboration with the CGEM, intends to help this segment of the graduate population to integrate professionally. It is indeed this segment that, for quite some time, has been... problematic for the public authorities, if only because of the interminable sit-ins it organizes in Rabat, in particular. These graduates, holders of bachelor's and sometimes doctoral degrees, have great difficulty finding jobs, often because they have received literary or overly general training (see box). The distribution of placements by type of diploma shows that 39% of the beneficiaries of training/insertion contracts come from vocational training, 24% hold a baccalaureate and only 21% are graduates of higher education. The company, as we can see, is not in a hurry to recruit them. They need retraining to be able to integrate the business world; this is the purpose of the CIP. In another way, this will undoubtedly help to relieve the pressure on the state which, under pressure from street protest movements, had allocated, at the end of February, some 4,300 budget positions - out of the 18,800 to be created for the year 2011 - specifically to the recruitment of unemployed graduates, while 2011 was precisely the starting point for the generalization of recruitment through competitive examinations...
Focus: Older people find jobs faster
According to the latest HCP survey on employment in Morocco over the last decade, the decrease in unemployment (to 9.1%) has not benefited all types of job seekers and all residential areas in the same proportions. Thus, notes the HCP, unemployment is particularly high among young people aged 15 to 24, with a rate of 17.6% nationally and 31.3% in urban areas, among holders of higher education diplomas with 18.1% (22.3% for university graduates) and among first-time job seekers who, in 2010, accounted for 50% of unemployment. Hence the interest of the training/insertion contract, also known as the first job contract.
The HCP survey also pointed out an interesting observation to remember: job creation over the last ten years has benefited, in order, people aged 40 to 59 and then those aged 30 to 39. Young people aged 15 to 24, on the other hand, lost 9,000 jobs each year.
Salah Agueniou.
Published June 29, 2011
Posted online June 30, 2011
www.lavieeco.com
The government wants to boost employment - particularly for young graduates - as it committed to in the social agreement of April 26, and, in this sense, an agreement was recently signed with the General Confederation of Moroccan Enterprises (CGEM).
Two "urgent" measures have been decided in this agreement. The first concerns the improvement of the training/insertion contract called the Idmaj contract. This improvement, according to sources at the National Agency for the Promotion of Employment and Skills (ANAPEC, manager of the system), consists in granting the beneficiaries of the Idmaj contract full social coverage: health and pension insurance. In a way, this is the Achilles' heel of the training/insertion contract, as the program's monitoring and evaluation surveys also point out.
The employer's share of these contributions for health and pension insurance will be covered by the government instead of the company, but on condition that the company enters into an indefinite contract (CDI) with the trainee. The period of social contribution coverage by the state is one year.
According to ANAPEC estimates, this measure will cost the state 200 MDH. It will be in addition to the bonuses already granted to the company since the implementation of this system in 2006: exemption from income tax and professional tax for 24 months, extended by 12 months in the case of a common law contract (CDI). But given the low level of salaries paid by companies to beneficiaries of Idmaj contracts (80% do not exceed 2,500 DH per month), the income tax exemption is therefore granted automatically. In other words, only 20% of contracts exceed 2,500 DH per month, of which barely 3% reach 6,000 DH, and therefore are subject to exemption under the contract. This also explains, incidentally, the...modesty of the tax cost of this measure: 20 million DH per year. And this can also explain the "success" of this system whose tax carrot, it should be recalled, has been extended in the current Finance Act until the end of 2012 (for another 2 years).
According to ANAPEC data, the training/insertion contract benefited, between 2006 and 2010, some 200,000 people, at an average of 40,000 per year. About 80% of these beneficiaries were recruited permanently either in the company where they did their internship, or in another company (which probably offered them a higher salary).
The integration contract targets university graduates with a Bac+4 and above
The second measure decided in the agreement by the government and the CGEM concerns the professional integration of young graduates in difficulty. The system that will be put in place is called the "Professional Integration Contract" (CIP). The target: young people who are difficult to integrate and who are mainly university graduates (Bac + 4, DES, etc.). These young graduates will be supported in the company as part of an integration plan; they will benefit from training and supervision, with a tutor, for 6 to 9 months. The state's contribution, at this level, will consist of covering training costs and, if this training leads to a CDI, paying the company an allowance of 20,000 DH per beneficiary of the CDI.
Very clearly, the government, in collaboration with the CGEM, intends to help this segment of the graduate population to integrate professionally. It is indeed this segment that, for quite some time, has been... problematic for the public authorities, if only because of the interminable sit-ins it organizes in Rabat, in particular. These graduates, holders of bachelor's and sometimes doctoral degrees, have great difficulty finding jobs, often because they have received literary or overly general training (see box). The distribution of placements by type of diploma shows that 39% of the beneficiaries of training/insertion contracts come from vocational training, 24% hold a baccalaureate and only 21% are graduates of higher education. The company, as we can see, is not in a hurry to recruit them. They need retraining to be able to integrate the business world; this is the purpose of the CIP. In another way, this will undoubtedly help to relieve the pressure on the state which, under pressure from street protest movements, had allocated, at the end of February, some 4,300 budget positions - out of the 18,800 to be created for the year 2011 - specifically to the recruitment of unemployed graduates, while 2011 was precisely the starting point for the generalization of recruitment through competitive examinations...
Focus: Older people find jobs faster
According to the latest HCP survey on employment in Morocco over the last decade, the decrease in unemployment (to 9.1%) has not benefited all types of job seekers and all residential areas in the same proportions. Thus, notes the HCP, unemployment is particularly high among young people aged 15 to 24, with a rate of 17.6% nationally and 31.3% in urban areas, among holders of higher education diplomas with 18.1% (22.3% for university graduates) and among first-time job seekers who, in 2010, accounted for 50% of unemployment. Hence the interest of the training/insertion contract, also known as the first job contract.
The HCP survey also pointed out an interesting observation to remember: job creation over the last ten years has benefited, in order, people aged 40 to 59 and then those aged 30 to 39. Young people aged 15 to 24, on the other hand, lost 9,000 jobs each year.
Salah Agueniou.
Published June 29, 2011
Posted online June 30, 2011
www.lavieeco.com
