On January 10, 2023, Royal Decree-Law 1/2023, of January 10, on urgent measures regarding incentives for job hiring and improving the social protection of artists, was published.

This royal decree-law is structured into an expository part and a operative part, made up of forty-two articles, distributed in three chapters, and which includes the new regulation regarding incentives for labor hiring. Likewise, seventeen additional provisions, four transitional provisions, a single repealing provision and thirteen final provisions are included. Its purpose is to regulate incentives aimed at promoting job hiring, as well as other programs or measures to promote and maintain stable and quality employment financed by bonuses in Social Security contributions and by joint collection concepts, or developed through other employment support instruments.

Modifications are made to articles 16, 138 and 139 of the consolidated text of the General Law of Social Security in order to incorporate in said provisions the powers of ex officio review that correspond to the Social Security Administration in matters of framing acts in the event of non-compliance with the legal requirements applicable in this regard.

This new regulation prevents the challenge of the framing acts from being transferred to the Social Jurisdiction and remains in the Jurisdiction competent to hear this matter, the Contentious-Administrative Jurisdiction.

The  modification of article 36 of the consolidated text of the General Law of Social Security Its purpose is to regulate the specialties of the simplified settlement system in the event that the General Treasury of Social Security exercises its powers to verify payment settlements based on data or criteria incorporated with a date after the settlement was carried out.

Article 153 bis is subject to modification to establish that the six months that must be used to calculate the average contribution base to which said provision refers are those immediately preceding the month prior to the beginning of the situation, thus enabling the immediate calculation of said average contribution base.

An important part of the modifications made to the consolidated text of the General Social Security Law concern the compatibility between the retirement pension and artistic activity, both self-employed and employed.

For this reason, this royal decree-law introduces into the consolidated text of the General Law of Social Security the  new article 249 ter, which allows the compatibility of artistic activity as self-employed or employed with the receipt of the full amount of the retirement pension in the Social Security system, with no further obligation than to request registration and contribute to the corresponding regime for professional contingencies, as well as for employed workers, in accordance with the new article 153 ter, with a special solidarity contribution of 9 percent on the basis of contributions for common contingencies, not computable for the purposes of benefits, which will be distributed between employers and workers. This compatibility extends to the retirement pensions of the Special Regime for Self-Employed or Self-Employed Workers through the modification of article 318 d), as well as the contribution during the compatibility of the pension and artistic activity, although exclusively borne by the worker, in accordance with the  new article 310 bis.

On the other hand, through  addition of a new letter m) to section 2 of article 305 of the consolidated text of the General Law of Social Security, we proceed to include those who carry out an artistic activity on their own among the groups that expressly declare themselves included in the Special Social Security Regime for Self-Employed or Self-Employed Workers.

Finally, the rule addresses the special situation of self-employed artists with low income, understood in the terms provided for in the first additional provision of Royal Decree-Law 5/2022, of March 22, which adapts the regime of the special employment relationship of people dedicated to artistic activities, as well as the technical and auxiliary activities necessary for their development, and improves the working conditions of the sector. To this end, article 313 bis establishes a reduced contribution that allows self-employed artists to make their creative activity compatible with their inclusion in the Social Security system, in compliance with the mandate contained in the first additional provision of the aforementioned royal decree-law. The fifth transitional provision determines what the contribution base provided for in the first paragraph of the article will be for 2023, as well as its modification in subsequent years through the General State Budget Law.

Taking into account that the artistic worker, due to the intermittency characteristic of his activity, will inevitably be forced to alternate periods of employment with periods of inactivity, it is necessary to adapt the requirements for access to unemployment benefit, configuring a permanent but also economically sustainable benefit.

The duration of the unemployment benefit will be 120 days and its amount will be equal to 80 percent of the monthly Public Multiple Effect Income Indicator (IPREM) in force at all times, except when the daily average of the contribution bases corresponding to the last sixty days of actual provision of services in artistic activity is greater than 60 euros, in which case it will be equal to 100 percent of the IPREM.