Pay Related Social Insurance, almost always called PRSI, is Ireland's contribution on earnings. It funds the contributory State Pension and the other social insurance payments, and the contributions you build up decide which of them you can claim. Your employer pays its own share on top of yours.
Every worker has a PRSI class, and the class sets the rate. Most private sector employees are Class A. Your employer deducts it through payroll, and Revenue collects it and passes it to the Department of Social Protection, which publishes the Class A rates. The employee rate is 4.2% of all your pay, rising to 4.35% from 1 October 2026. If you earn €352 a week or less you pay nothing, and between €352.01 and €424 a week a PRSI credit of up to €12 softens the step.
The rate applies to the whole of your pay with no upper limit, so PRSI keeps growing in line with your salary. On €50,000 earned evenly across 2026, nine months at 4.2% and three at 4.35% average 4.2375%, which is €2,118.75.
PRSI sits beside two other deductions on an Irish payslip, income tax and the Universal Social Charge, and it is the only one of the three that earns benefit entitlement. A pension contribution reduces neither: Revenue gives no USC relief for one, and PRSI is charged on the same full pay.
The take-home pay calculator shows PRSI (Class A) as its own line, applies the credit for low weekly pay and counts employer PRSI in the cost to employer.