Lobbying for entrepreneurs

The Union of Professional Engineers in Finland also welcomes engineering entrepreneurs. Promoting entrepreneurship is part of the Union’s lobbying work. Dynamic entrepreneurial activity in technical fields is in the interests of both employees and entrepreneurs.

Increasing number of employees act as entrepreneurs

Working life is transforming and more and more incomes can come from many sources. The traditional employee-entrepreneur division is becoming blurred as many people work with both statuses. The Union believes that people must be able to make use of different forms of work and that transitioning between different statuses must be easy and smooth for the individual.

Entrepreneurs play essential roles in the new economic structure and job creation. It is therefore important to ensure that legislation and other conditions are optimal for entrepreneurship to take place. The social security of micro-enterprises and sole entrepreneurs needs to be improved to prevent a small company from facing unreasonable problems, for example as a result of illness.

To promote the interest of entrepreneurs in 2021, the Union of Professional Engineers in Finland aims to:

Promote flexible work in different forms.

• Introduce, develop, and extend unemployment insurance that takes into consideration pay from regular work and entrepreneurial work.
• Enhance the position of entrepreneurs by improving the self-employed’s pension cover (YEL) to better cover the self-employment and prevent underinsurance.

Entrepreneurs also receive support within the union

The interests of entrepreneurs are lobbied for by the Union’s Committee of Entrepreneurs. The Committee of Entrepreneurs focuses on maintaining entrepreneurs’ ability to work and their skills. The Committee actively works to improve the unemployment protection of entrepreneurs and aims to promote networking for entrepreneurs.

The Union of Professional Engineers in Finland is also a member of Akavalaiset Yrittäjät (AKY). Through AKY, the Union promotes the interests of entrepreneurs and offers benefits to its entrepreneur members.

Members of the Union of Professional Engineers in Finland are automatically entitled to the benefits offered by AKY.