Gov’t Disburses Wage Subsidy for Workers

Minister of Manpower Ida Fauziyah delivers a statement in a joint press conference with President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and Minister of Social Affairs Tri Rismaharini at the Merdeka Palace, Jakarta, Friday (09/16). Photo by: PR of Cabinet Secretariat/Rahmat

The Government has disbursed wage subsidy assistance (BSU) for the first batch of eligible workers, according to Minister of Manpower Ida Fauziyah.

“In the first batch, we have distributed the subsidy to 4,112,052 workers on Wednesday,” the Minister said  in a joint press conference with President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and Minister of Social Affairs Tri Rismaharini at the Merdeka Palace, Jakarta, Friday (09/16).

To receive the subsidy, Ida added, the workers must meet the requirements stipulated in Regulation of Minister of Manpower Number 10 of 2022.

“Preliminary data shows that workers who get salary of Rp 3.5 million per month were 16 million (workers). After we synchronize the data, the estimated beneficiaries were 14,639,675 workers,” the Minister said.

The requirements for the wage subsidy recipients include:

– Being an Indonesian Citizen (WNI).

– Being an active participant of the Social Security Agency for Workers (BPJS Ketenagakerjaan) as of July 2022.

– Having a maximum wage of Rp3.5 million per month (additional provisions apply for workers in areas

with minimum wage higher than Rp3.5 million)

The Minister underscored that the distribution of wage subsidy is different from that of 2021 which is implemented to areas under activity restrictions policy (PPKM) level 1. This year’s wage subsidy assistance is distributed at the national level for workers who have not received any social assistance.

“We have received data from the BPJS Ketenagakerjaan for 5,099,915 workers. We did a screening in accordance with the Regulations, and 4,361,792 workers are eligible [for the subsidy]. After that, there was verification and validation measures conducted by banks and 249,740 workers did not meet the requirement,” she added.

Ida said that the Ministry will help prospective wage subsidy recipients who did not have any account at State-Owned Enterprise banks to open the bank account or distribute the subsidy through state postal company PT Pos Indonesia.

“[For the second batch], we received data of 2,406,915 workers from the BPJS Ketenagakerjaan. As in the first batch, we will synchronize the data with other program recipients,” she said.

The Minister further said that the Ministry would make improvements to address the problems occurred in the process of the wage subsidy distribution. (TGH/AIT/ST) (RI/LW)