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Published Tuesday, May 5, 2020
400,000 will receive
monetary bonusThis week, the Ministry of Labor, in a joint effort with the Social Aid Institute, began reviewing 304,000 Protect Bonus applications, the government announced. In addition to the 100,000-plus beneficiaries announced last month, this brings the total to more than 400,000 people. The so-called “Bono Proteger” is a monetary aid for people affected at their place of employment by the suspension of commercial operations imposed by the government since March, as part of the precautionary measures to contain the expansion of covid-19. Currently, there 337 active covid-19 patients in the country, reported the Ministry of Health on Monday. The subsidies are between $110 to $220 for laid-off workers and those whose working hours were reduced or contracts suspended, due to the coronavirus emergency. The monetary aid will be paid to the beneficiaries for three months. According to the ministry, it is already scheduled to pay 168,000 beneficiaries. Of these, 37% are independent workers, 30% were dismissed, 20% are informal or temporary workers and 13% have a temporary suspension of their employment contract. Also, another 67,000 bonus applications will be processed by the Institute. On April 26, with 49 votes for and one against, the deputies of the Congress approved the additional budget of $651,558,798 to be used in payment of the deficit and to cover expenses caused by the economic crisis due to the covid-19. According to Congress, this additional budget of $513,301,199 is a loan from the Venezuela-based Development Bank of Latin America, CAF. The rest of the budget of $138,257,599 was the summary of the budget from other public institutions that had not yet been used, which belong to the government. The extra budget of $381,400,272 will be used to pay the government debt. The rest of approximately $270,158,526 will be transferred to the relief fund for families affected by the pandemic, said the Congress in its statement. "After the approval of the extraordinary budget in the Legislative Assembly, we have the budget to pay more than 400,000 affected people," said Geannina Dinarte, minister of Labor. "It fills us with satisfaction to see that we are already moving forward with the first group of 168,000 people who in the coming days will receive this financial support. ” According to Dinarte, the bond deposit has already been made to 70,000 beneficiaries. Since it was announced that help could be requested at Proteger.go.cr, a total of 562,000 applications have been received, the ministry said in its statement. Then, the government must carry out the process to cover the lack of money to grant the bond to more than 160,000 or to discard the aid in these cases. According to the statistics provided by the government, a few hours after financial aid was announced, the site Proteger received a total of 1,726,953 visits. --------------------- Is the government in your country offering fair financial support packages to those affected at their place of employment as a result of the pandemic? We would like to know your thoughts on this story. Send your comments to news@amcostarica.com |
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