He Incentive Fund, which acts as a supplement to teachers’ income, It has been down since January 1 of this year and the government shows no signs of wanting to renew it.
Some governors, like the one from Buenos Aires Axel Kicillof, and Arabella Carreras, from Río Negro, are already shouting to the sky, warning that if the aid is not renewed they will not continue paying it with their own funds.
He National Teacher Incentive Fund (FONID) was created in 1998, in the framework of a dispute over salaries that the then president Carlos Menem had with the Confederation of Education Workers of the Argentine Republic (CTERA).
Who defines teacher salaries
Since education services were already transferred to the provinces and, logically, the national government has no influence on salaries, The FONID was devised with a specific allocation tax on cars of US$4,000 in value. This sought to equalize salaries at the national level. They were looking to raise 600 million dollars
The fund and the tax were created temporarily, for 5 years. Of them, andThe car tax became the only tax created temporarily that respected that characteristic. Today the tax does not applybut the FONID was extended by decree year after year and was financed with budget resources.
The last renewal was on January 1, 2022, for a period of two years. Which implies that on January 1, 2024, the validity of the FONID ended. Without a decree that keeps this aid in force, 2023 was the last year.
The view of the consultants
As pointed out Alejandro Pegoraro, owner of the consulting firm Politikon Chacolast year the National Teacher Incentive Fund (FONID) registered accrued expenses of $332,800 million but of which about $290,000 million were paid. Last year, some $42.5 billion remained pending payment.
In January, only about $56,000 million were earned, according to a report from the consulting firm, but only $12 million was paid. According to experts in the field, the money that is pending payment to the provinces corresponds to back in November and December. Now the government owes the provinces amounts for the 2nd and 3rd quarters of 2023.
Therefore, in a context inWhat dialogue is totally broken between the national government and the provincesPresident Javier Milei believes that he will not issue the decree to renew the fund, whose additional salaries will then be the responsibility of the governors if they can maintain it.
Mario Perna, former Minister of Education of Catamarca, He warned regarding FONID that “its fall is a chronicle foretold and a prelude to a serious educational conflict.”
“Far from promoting improvements for the teaching sector, we are witnessing, days before the start of the school year, a disdain by politics towards one of the actors in the system,” said Perna on the X social network.
Flavio Buccino, education specialistpoints out that the fall of FONID It is “the tip of the nationalization of a salary dispute that impacts 1 million teachers.”
Alberto Fernández and the FONID
Sebastian Domínguez, CEO of SDC Tax Advisorsremembers that “in 1999, through Law 25,053, the FONID was created and the tax that had to be paid on automobiles, whose market cost exceeded $4,000, motorcycles and motorbikes with more than two hundred 200 cubic centimeters of displacement, boats and aircraft, registered or established in the national territory.”
The taxman pointed out that the tax rate was 1% 1.5%depending on the case, but Congress repealed it as of January 1, 2000.
“The Government of Alberto Fernández tried to apply it again during 2021. With that objective, it included an article in the Budget Bill for the year 2021 and restored it for 1 year. Although the validity was restored, the regulations were never implemented, nor the requirement to pay the tax for that period,” Domínguez said.
Source: Ambito
