The co-author of 500+ has a new idea for improving the fertility rate. Another voucher
500+ has not improved the demographic situation in Poland, but the co-author of the program, Bartosz Marczuk, former deputy minister of family, has another idea to reverse the trend. Twice a charm?
It was a real revolution – on April 1, 2016, Beata Szydło’s government began implementing the “Family 500+” program announced two years earlier. Apart from economists, Bartosz Marczuk, currently an expert at the Sobieski Institute, played a key role in its creation.
The main assumption of the program was to grant monthly financial support of PLN 500 for each child in the family, regardless of the family’s income. The program was intended to provide financial support for families in raising children and to increase fertility rates, so initially money could only be obtained for the second and subsequent children in the family.
500+ has made enormous contributions to eliminating poverty among the poorest families
After almost 9 years, experts agree that the program has significantly reduced the poverty rate among children. After just two years, prof. Ryszard Szarfenberg announced that compared to 2014, extreme poverty among children was reduced by more than half (54%), and relative poverty by 30%.
The program did not eliminate women from the labor market, which was feared, and it had a positive impact on tourism, but unfortunately it did not increase the fertility rate, which was its main goal.
Housing voucher for children also before marriage
Bartosz Marczuk did not give up his weapons. He proposes the introduction of a housing voucher that would encourage young people to start families and have children. – Improving housing conditions has a real impact on the increase in the fertility rate – he argued in “Fakt”, citing research and experience from other countries.
The housing voucher would be financial support for families, and its amount would depend on the number of children. The first child will receive PLN 40,000. PLN, for the second one – PLN 60,000. PLN, and for the third one – as much as PLN 100,000. zloty. The benefit can be used not only to purchase a flat, but also to renovate or enlarge an existing flat.
– The first voucher, i.e. PLN 40,000. PLN, would be paid depending on what happens first: marriage or the birth of a child. In Poland, about 30 percent children are born out of wedlock, so this situation must be taken into account. On the other hand, statistics show that marriages are more “promising” when it comes to having children, so the first 40,000 would be paid depending on what comes first: either the wedding or the birth of a child – explains the Sobieski Institute expert.
