Social and health contributions

Only one contribution leaves the employee’s pay

This is the single most misread part of a Moldovan salary, so it is worth stating plainly. Out of the gross, the employee pays only the AOAM medical premium — the mandatory health-insurance contribution of 9 %(Legea 1593/2002). That is the whole of the employee’s social side. Alongside the 12 % income tax, it is one of the only two things withheld from gross pay before the money reaches your account.

Everything else you may have heard about — the state social-insurance contribution, the 24 % or 29 % figure — belongs to the employer, not to you. Understanding which side each contribution falls on is the difference between an estimate that is roughly right and one that is wrong by nearly a quarter of your salary.

AOAM — the employee’s health premium

The prima de asigurare obligatorie de asistență medicală (AOAM) is a flat 9 % of the gross, withheld by the employer and paid to the health-insurance fund (CNAM). It does two things at once: it reduces your net pay, and it also lowers the income-tax base, since tax is charged on the income that remains after AOAM. So a single 9 % premium quietly softens the tax bill as well.

CAS/BASS — the employer’s contribution, not yours

The state social-insurance contribution — CAS, into the state social-insurance budget (BASS) — funds pensions and other social benefits. Since 1 January 2021 it is owed entirely by the employer: the old individual employee contribution was abolished on that date, and nothing replaced it on the employee side. There is no employee social line on a Moldovan payslip at all.

The employer rate depends on the sector, and it is a cost the employer carries on top of your gross:

• Private sector — 24 % of the gross.
• Budgetary (public) sector — 29 % of the gross.

Why the employer cost still matters to you

Even though CAS does not come out of your pay, it shapes the total cost of employing you: your gross plus the employer’s 24 % (private) contribution is what the job actually costs. That total is useful context when you negotiate, or when you compare an employment contract with other arrangements. The income-tax and tax-allowances pages cover the parts that do come out of your gross.

The IT Park exception

One regime breaks this structure entirely. Companies resident in a Moldova IT Park (Legea 77/2016) pay a single tax (impozit unic) of 7 % of revenue — with a per-employee floor of 5 220 lei a month — and that single tax replaces income tax, AOAM and the employer’s CAS all at once. For an IT Park employee there is no withholding: net pay equals gross pay. If you work under this regime, the ordinary 9 %-plus-tax chain described above does not apply to you; it is a clearly separate, hedged case rather than the default path this site models.