Belgium: Changes to reductions in social security contributions for first hires as of 2024 )

In order to boost the creation of employment, Belgium knows a system of reductions of the social security contributions paid for the first employees hired by a company. This system is applied to new employers of new employees, which means employers which never engaged employees before. As these reductions are rather expensive for the social security budget, the reductions will be reduced as of 2024.

The current system provides for a fixed reduction of 4,000 EUR per quarter for the first hire on a permanent basis. However, for the 2^nd until the 6^th hire, the reduction will gradually decrease and will end after the 13^th quarter.

Schematically, the reduction-system until 31 December 2023 is as follows:

As from 1 January 2024, the reduction-system will be as follows:

As you can see, the reduction for the 1^st hire is reduced with 900 EUR to 3,100 but remains permanent in time. The system for the 2^nd hire remains the same and the 3^rd hire is now promoted to the same level of reductions (this is the only increase in reductions under the new system). They will no longer receive any reduction after the 13rd quarter ends. Finally, the reductions for the 4^th, 5^th, and 6^th hire are eliminated from the system.

The system will only apply to hires as from 1 January 2024. This means that the current, more beneficial systems will continue to apply to employees hired before the end of 2023. Therefore, in some cases it might be wise to hire new employees before the new system comes in place.

Source: Act of 16 October 2023 regarding diverse provisions in social matters