Social Democrats promise a double child benefit twice a year — about 5,000 kronor more for a family with two children
The Social Democrats will fight Sweden's September election on a promise to pay child benefit and the study allowance twice over before each Christmas and summer holiday. The pledge was announced on 9 August by party leader Magdalena Andersson and the party's economic policy spokesperson Mikael Damberg, at a press conference held ahead of Andersson's summer speech in Stockholm.
Child benefit is currently 1,250 kronor per child per month. Under the proposal, one extra monthly payment would be made twice a year — in December, before the Christmas holidays, and in June, before the summer holidays. For a family with two children that adds up to roughly 5,000 kronor more per year. The large-family supplement, flerbarnstillägget, is not covered by the promise. The Social Democrats want the doubled payments to be permanent rather than a one-off.
The payment would not be means-tested. It would go to everyone with children regardless of income, which Damberg defended as a way of holding society together — the same principle, he argued, that gives everyone cancer treatment regardless of what they earn. Andersson and Damberg pointed to several hard years for families with children, with steep food prices, higher rents and more expensive mortgages.
This is an election promise, not a decision, and nothing about your payments changes now. Child benefit continues to be paid by Försäkringskassan on the current rules, automatically, with no application needed for children born in Sweden. The proposal is costed at around six billion kronor a year. Finance minister Elisabeth Svantesson has warned that the Social Democrats would need to raise taxes to pay for it; Damberg says the party has included a child benefit increase in its budget motions for years and has already named the tax measures it would use. Whether any of it happens depends on the September election result and on a budget passing afterwards.