The government will start eliminating the rich from the list of cash subsidies only when it is sure about people’s real income and wealth, First Vice President Es’haq Jahangiri, told Eghtesad news on Sunday, reacting to the recent decision by the parliament, which compels the government to remove nearly 5.5 million people from the cash subsidy list.
“If we conclude that there are people with high monthly salaries, who are also receiving monthly cash payment from the government, we will definitely remove them from the list. Otherwise we are not going to confront people over the issue,” he said.
“We are frequently asked to remove managers from the list. If we know that there are managers with a monthly salary of 30 million rials (about $1075 based on official exchange rate) we will remove them from the list. But, the number of such people does not exceed 100,000 across the country,” he added.
Based on government data, the number of rich people, who can afford to take foreign trips or who own luxury cars, does not exceed one million nationwide.
The parliament on Tuesday decided to lower the cap for the total cash subsidies from 42 trillion rials ($1.5 billion at official exchange rate) as anticipated in the proposed budget bill for the upcoming Iranian year (starting March 21) to 39 trillion rials ($1.4 billion).
It also decided that the government should stop the payment of cash subsidies to affluent households, in accordance with Note 21 of the Subsidy Reform Act. The by-law for implementing this note is to be prepared by the Management and Planning Organization (MPO) in cooperation with the relevant ministries within the next three months.
