According to the Law on Social Insurance 2014 ( valid until June 30, 2025), the subjects participating in compulsory social insurance are mainly those working under fixed-term or indefinite-term labor contracts.
However, according to Vietnam Social Security, there are currently many cases of employees working under other forms of agreements, leading to them not being able to participate in compulsory social insurance and losing the necessary social security benefits.
To overcome this problem and institutionalize the viewpoint of social security reform towards universal social insurance, the Social Insurance Law 2024 has added regulations to expand the subjects participating in compulsory social insurance.
In particular, regarding the labor contract factor, Point a, Clause 1, Article 2 of the Law on Social Insurance 2024 stipulates that the subjects participating in compulsory social insurance are: "People working under indefinite-term labor contracts, fixed-term labor contracts with a term of 01 month or more, including cases where employees and employers agree by other names but have content showing that the employment has paid wages, salaries and the management, operation and supervision of one party".
This new regulation reflects the change in the way of viewing labor relations, ensuring: the nature of work, wages and management and supervision are the factors that determine the participation in compulsory social insurance, instead of only relying on the name and form of the contract.
This helps protect the rights of many workers working in informal forms or contracts with other names (such as: service contracts, collaboration contracts... but with dependent factors) which are actually labor relations.
In addition, the 2024 Social Insurance Law also expands other groups of subjects participating in compulsory social insurance from July 1, 2025, including: Business owners of business households with business registration; Business managers, controllers, state capital representatives, business capital representatives; Board members, General Directors, Directors, members of the Control Board or controllers and other management positions elected by cooperatives, cooperative unions who do not receive salaries; Part-time workers; Part-time workers in villages and residential groups; Permanent militia forces.
According to Vietnam Social Security, with the addition to compulsory social insurance participation, employees will enjoy full social insurance regimes including: sickness, maternity, work accidents, occupational diseases, retirement and death.
It can be seen that continuing to expand the subjects participating in compulsory social insurance of the Social Insurance Law in 2024 is an important step in perfecting the multi-layered social security system in Vietnam.
This not only ensures the legitimate rights of workers, helping them stabilize their lives when facing risks, but also contributes to the goal of covering the entire population of social insurance, strengthening people's trust in the social security policies of the Party and the State.
