Announcements of higher pensions and wages, one-off financial assistance, cheaper medicines and spa holiday vouchers for Serbia’s elderly citizens are being seen as signs that elections are approaching. This is the view of sources interviewed by Danas daily, who argue that these measures are not the result of a systematic state policy but rather part of an election campaign. They say the practice of using social policy as a tool for securing political support is continuing.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, along with other government officials, has in recent months repeatedly announced pension increases, stressing that pensioners with the lowest incomes will benefit the most.
However, aside from the regular pension indexation that is carried out under current legislation on 1 December each year – meaning this is not any kind of extraordinary increase – Vučić recently announced an additional package of support for pensioners.
Speaking on TV Prva, he promised pensioners spa vouchers, cheaper medicines and one-off financial assistance.
“We will pay particular attention to how we can give a little more to poorer pensioners than to those with high pensions,” Vučić reiterated, repeating a promise he had made earlier.
“The assistance is feasible, but it serves as a way of securing political support”
The announced support measures for pensioners, including one-off payments, subsidised medicines and other forms of assistance, are in principle possible and feasible, Professor Milojko Arsić of the Faculty of Economics in Belgrade said.
However, he points out that the impression is that these measures are not part of a long-term state strategy but are primarily intended as a means of securing political support from older voters ahead of anticipated elections.
“That appears to be the main motive behind these measures,” Arsić said.
He emphasised that assistance for socially vulnerable citizens is justified but warned that it should not be directed exclusively at pensioners. “This type of support is justified for all poor people. We should not limit it solely to pensioners, because there are poor elderly people who are not pensioners, as well as younger people who are not retired and who have relatively low incomes. If social policy is being pursued, they should also be included so that they are not discriminated against,” the professor said.
According to him, in some cases pensioners are actually in a more favourable position than citizens who do not receive pensions or who are unemployed.
Speaking about the availability of budget funds, Arsić noted that it is still impossible to estimate the overall cost accurately because it is not yet known how much money will be allocated to the package.
“It is not certain how much the support package will cost in total. It may exceed the agreed limit of three per cent of GDP, but I do not think the overshoot will be particularly large and it will probably be kept moderate,” Arsić said.
As he explained, the final assessment will depend on the size of the one-off payment, the extent of medicine subsidies and the categories of beneficiaries entitled to support.
Asked whether such measures could further fuel inflation, Arsić said he does not expect them to lead to higher prices.
“There should not be any inflationary pressure because this is not a particularly large package. A more precise assessment will only be possible once it is known how much money will be allocated, how much pensioners will receive, which pensioners will be covered and so on,” he said. He added that any permanent increase in pensions would require the state to secure additional sources of funding in the future.
“That would mean either introducing additional taxes to finance those expenditures or reducing some other forms of spending,” he warned. Nevertheless, Arsić believes that certain permanent social protection measures would make sense, given that spending on social protection in Serbia is not particularly high compared with other countries.
However, he stressed that such decisions should form part of long-term planning rather than being a reaction to current political circumstances.
“We pay into insurance to receive a pension, not one-off assistance”
Economist Milan Kovačević believes that the practice of one-off payments to pensioners should be reduced and insists that resources from the Pension and Disability Insurance Fund should primarily be used for the regular payment of pensions.
“There should be as few one-off expenditures and withdrawals from the Pension Insurance Fund as possible in order to maintain regular pension payments, because such individual payments always serve some other purpose and are not part of genuine insurance,” Kovačević added.
He reminded readers that the purpose of pension insurance is to provide regular pensions, not one-off financial assistance. “When we pay into insurance, we do so in order to receive a pension, not one-off aid,” he stressed. Kovačević added that this type of assistance is not systematically regulated and does not cover all beneficiaries under equal conditions.
(Danas, 16.06.2026)