We asked ourselves what we would like to see under the Christmas tree this year for our seniors, our families and our communities.
The pandemic has highlighted the invaluable contribution of natural caregivers, beneficiary attendants and home help needs in an economy of full employment.
Then, we thought that Quebec could take the initiative to close the great loop of solidarity started in a pandemic, by creating a “Grand national checkbook” program like the European program of universal service employment check (CESU ), which is intended to be a simplified offer to easily declare the remuneration of an employee at home for personal service activities (support for an elderly or disabled person, housekeeping, school support, odd jobs, etc.).
The CESU program allows the employee to access existing workers’ compensation and benefits, while ensuring that all payroll taxes have been paid at source through a third party payer, often a large bank.
The employer-user, a family or an individual, benefits from the administration of said contributions and protection against any legal action for work accidents, in addition to benefiting from a tax credit or reduction.
The government, for its part, collects contributions to its social benefits (RRQ, CNESST, etc.), which normally escape undeclared labor income. Such a program would thus reveal activities in our communities, until now invisible to the system, but very necessary, such as those of back-up or emergency care, home support, the work of natural caregivers and that of help. -moving of all stripes as well as odd jobs ranging from painting to house and grounds maintenance. Limited to a certain threshold per household, it would cost taxpayers nothing, since it was paid for by the user, and would make it possible – for some people – to promote the training acquired in times of a pandemic, while promoting the extension of life at home.
After the pandemic, there will be additional needs and demands on the part of the elderly to get help at home and on the part of parents to access extra support and babysitting services. There will also be a government having to refurbish its own accounts which have been exhausted in an unprecedented way.
The government of Quebec, with the banks, could thus ensure, in a gesture of solidarity, that invisible work in our daily lives appears and that all these people find their place, both from the point of view of their health protection. work or pension scheme than from the point of view of taxation in general. In the end, everyone wins.