PCP
A new law after the 2017 rejections
RFFA combined company taxation and additional AHV funding. The brochure recalled the 2017 failures, but the package was not delayed implementation of Corporate Tax Reform III or Old Age Provision 2020. It had different measures and its own decision.
Following approval, the Federal Council on 14 June set full commencement for 1 January 2020. Certain transitional provisions operated earlier after formal validation. Revenue announced for 2020 cannot therefore be counted as funds already received throughout 2019.
Benefits also need separation. RFFA funded the insurance scheme; it did not create the CHF70 supplement rejected in 2017. Confusing the packages would invent pension entitlements.
First channel: payroll contributions
The AHV contribution rate rose by 0.3 percentage points, split into 0.15 each for employees and employers. These are points applied to the contribution base, not merely a 0.3% increase in the previous payment. The unit matters when reading a payslip.
This channel links receipts to contributory payroll. It involves paid work and employers, rather than directly collecting each company’s tax concession. Tax benefits and AHV payments can concern the same business on quite different bases.
The sharing follows collective financing. Social assessment must nevertheless consider disposable wages and employer funding together. The legal split does not describe every long-term economic effect, which this study does not quantify without specific research.
Two more channels: the Confederation and VAT
The package raised the federal contribution to AHV expenditure and assigned the entire demographic VAT point to the scheme. These are separate operations: federal expenditure and allocation of existing tax revenue that previously did not flow entirely to AHV.
Changing allocation does not itself impose another VAT point at a shop’s checkout. It changes the public recipient. Consolidated assessment must include the resources remaining for other federal tasks and the Confederation’s own contribution.
AHV can receive more without every other public budget improving by the same amount. Who receives, who pays and which obligation remains elsewhere must be visible. Public transfers are not all newly created resources.
Compensation described a political relationship
The brochure set estimated short-term tax losses alongside roughly CHF2 billion in additional annual AHV receipts. This underpinned the bargain. It did not mean every company would pay exactly its tax saving directly to AHV.
Beneficiaries, bases and timetables differed. Federal law removed special statuses and regulated instruments; cantons also chose rates. The brochure specified that related cantonal reductions were not all part of the federal ballot law. This architecture did not establish one uniform national company rate.
It is possible to recognise AHV’s additional funding while challenging the fairness of tax provisions. Supporting tax reform does not disprove every concern about municipal budgets. One ballot can combine choices whose separate effects still require examination.
For pensioners, the distinction between financing and benefits is immediately concrete. Better funding for the scheme does not necessarily increase their own monthly payment. A package therefore needs to say whether it protects continuity, changes entitlements or does both. That allows the social value of additional funding to be recognised without promising an income rise the measure does not provide. For tight household budgets this matters especially: stability of the paying system and individual purchasing power are connected, but are not the same immediately visible change on a bank statement.
More funding is not permanent equilibrium
The official dossier said RFFA reduced AHV’s financing need while further reform remained necessary. Additional receipts were not a perpetual balance guarantee. Revenue and expenditure continue to change.
Current flows and reserves require separate reading. Recurring receipts differ from one-off payments, and reserve movements from contributions. These distinctions stop a projection horizon being presented as a guaranteed result.
The PCP’s 2026 conclusion is solidarity legible down to its funding. Strong pensions require named contributions and an independent examination of tax advantages. Even an approved bargain needs distributional scrutiny. Insurance stability and municipalities’ ability to fund services are both responsibilities towards the population.