Welfare, Anpit: “The government gives companies the opportunity to offer health coverage”
Welfare centered on the role of the state no longer works. It is not sustainable also due to the demographic crisis. For this the State must rethink the assistance e businesses are ready to do their part. The government must allow the detaxation and decontribution of benefits. This is the message it sends Federico Iadicicco, number one of Anpitfrom the third edition of Pharmacytools for the economy and work, the training school of Anpit Company Italy in collaboration with his Study Center ‘Article 46’.
The event, in Orvieto from 18 to 20 May, was in fact an opportunity for profound reflection not only on the current welfare system, but above all on demographic evolution, the resulting adjustments and the necessary new policies which also involve companies. Three days, inaugurated by the mayor of Orvieto, Roberta Tardani, in which speeches and insights on equal opportunities, social justice, sustainable development, concessions, occupational safety, corporate welfare, collective agreements and business crises followed.
“The third edition of Apotheke was an opportunity to explore the contractual levers through which affirm a business model that sees the person and the community at the centreand which enhances the participation of workers as useful tools for combining productivity, growth and equity” commented the national president of Anpit Federico Iadicicco.
Anpit’s analysis on the state of the art in welfare and working hypotheses
The economic and social changes underway require a reflection on how to reform the welfare models of Western countries and also of Italy, because the traditional welfare state centered on the role of the state unfortunately – also due to the demographic crisis – is hardly sustainable. In this scenario Anpit considers it necessary to give strength to the intermediate bodies and the role that associationsin a social and economic context, they can represent new welfare models and look, in fact, at a welfare model as an active role of the State and intermediate bodies, first of all the family.
“Anpit has already worked a lot in the past to the subsidiary role that companies can offer within welfare models, so much so that in our national collective bargaining we have introduced the obligatory company welfare which must be provided to all employees of the companies that apply our collective agreements” explain the employers’ association. This compulsory welfare model produces a double benefit, because it can go both in the direction of acquiring various goods and services but, above all, it can be managed to integrate healthcare and pension benefits which are two of the major issues we are facing with respect to the welfare of the future. The latter will certainly provide, an active role of companies to offer health and insurance coverage to workers that somehow integrates the public one and this, however, can be done if welfare is encouraged.
“As Anpit we are doing our part as there is a need for an active intervention by the State that enhances more and more – from a fiscal and contributory point of view – corporate welfare by introducing elements of tax relief and decontribution of benefits and therefore of all that it is not provided as part of ordinary work remuneration but as complementary services” they add.
The other pillar is the enhancement of bilaterality
The association has already carried out an important work because the protection of maternity has been declined within the bilaterality. This means that the employees of the companies associated with Anpit benefit from a series of additional services that help in the moment of the birth of children. Theme, which represents one of the pieces of the great puzzle of interventions that Italy needs to reverse the demographic trend.
The central pillar of the new welfare, according to Anpit, is the family, therefore it is necessary to build a network of services in support of it which makes it possible to facilitate the work-life balance. Therefore, strong investments in ancillary services are needed, such as the possibility of using company nursery schools, services for the elderly, to allow families to freely manage work and family life without overloading themselves in physical and psychological terms.
To the government: “Favor companies for a change from one Welfare State at Well Communities”
But there is also a need for the government’s commitment to which Anpit is asking to integrate and expand the tax exemption and de-contribution of corporate welfare. To help and encourage companies that introduce elements of work-life balance in the company (e.g. kindergartens); and again, direct investment by the state to expand services for children and the elderly and put them into a system.
“There is a need for a welfare revolution that introduces – in addition to the active role of the state – also the active, proactive and concrete role of communities and intermediate bodies and this is possible – according to Anpit – if all those realities that in a subsidiary way offer welfare services to the person are valued economically and fiscally, replacing the State where it fails. Passing therefore from a ‘Welfare State’ to ‘Well Communities’, communities of good through the enhancement and active role of intermediate bodies, trying to promote them from an economic and social point of view”.