giving more wages = increasing your salary in your current
job
earn better wages = increasing your skills to move to better
paying job
Tharman is correct that increasing salary is a short term
solution that will lead to more inflation. More salary means it
will cost more for business and thus, they will charge more. When
they charge more, workers demand more salary and then the vicious
cycle spirial out of control, currency depreciates and very soon,
it'll be the end of this little red dot.
The way to control inflation is not by throwing money at it. It
is by trying to control interest rate, reduce the cost of doing
business and limit the increase in cost of living by enforcing
price control on basic necessities; of course, cutting ministerial
pay would definitely help but it has more political milege than
economical.
Sadly, our government is doing none of the above.
i dunoe abt how u get ur logic. yeah, it is always good to up ur
workers' productivity. but do you know that the more you try to
force out more productivity from workers, it is bad for the economy
as a whole?
employers get to operate at lower cost, hiring fewer workers.
industries needing fewer workers = retrenchment of existing workers
+ decreased job opportunities for job seekers + the surviving
workers get even more overworked.
cutting cost today isn't like when the case 10 yrs ago. 10 yrs
ago we import foreign labour to fill in crucial gaps in our
workforce, mainly the construction and manufacturing sectors.
today, those sectors are like 80% foreigners... so how is that
helping singaporeans? what is the point of keeping industries in
singapore, when they are not hiring any local workers? so you call
that securing jobs for singaporeans?
now, we have influx of foreign workers working in every sectors.
name me any sector, and you will find foreign workers in it.
alot of the foodcourts in shopping centers are now run by
foreign workers. e.g. sengkang mall.
you find foreign salesgirls, fast food cashiers working in fast
food chains and departmental stores.
you find pei du mama in our coffeeshops in the heartlands.
we now have PRC bus captains.
at a supermarket, (i shall not mention the branch), i saw PRC
butcher and fishmonger working in the supermarket.
our hospitals are flooded with foreign nurses.
our local universities are also flooded by foreign students. the
proportion of foreign students to locals is alarming.
our corporate administrators are spammed with foreigners of all
rank.
so far, the only vocation free of foreigners is in the SAF.....
but "wad an interesting career prospect".
IMO, having some foreigners to work in positions which no one
wants to do. however, the problem at hand is that we currently have
too much foreigners than our economy can actually support. to the
extent that there is negative competition, that their presence is
driving down wages, driving off ordinary singaporeans who have
families to support in singapore.
for example, 10 yrs ago, as a office administrator or
telemarketers, the rates are usually above $10 /hr.
now, we are seeing it drop to like $5-8 / hr. singaporeans
do still want to seek employment in these jobs. however, in many
cases, the wages are too low for them to support their families,
thus making them turn down job offers.
imagine, 1 foreign worker, and 1 local worker, both earn $1000
per month. the foreign worker would have no problem feeding
himself, and sending back any surplus back home. he may spend $800
on himself, and send back $200 back home to china, indonesia, india
etc. SGD$200 is a substantial sum in these countries, and can
support the worker's family.
however, this is not so in the case of the local workers.
assuming that he scrimps and spend $600, $400 is not enough to
support his parents, his parents-in-law, his wife and 2 kids. he
will be force to look for a better paying job to make ends
meet.
well, ppl can keep looking for better paying jobs. but so far,
there is no job which is free from such negative competition, where
foreigners are artificially depressing wages. so many more
"better-paying-jobs" are there left? how many will be left unharm
by the foreigners wage-depressing?
eventually, you will run out of "better-paying-job".
one such case is the case of engineering. 10 yrs ago engineers
are earning $5k per month. now, due to companies employing foreign
engineers, the wage has been depressed to around $2.5k if you are
fortunate. that is like a 50% drop in wage, can it does
serious damages to family finances. furthermore, it seems very
unlikely that engineering salary will ever go up again, with
companies prefering to import cheap foreign engineers, further
depressing wages.
and back to my earlier point. so what is good about a
foreign-own factory employing almost 100% foreign workers in
singapore? it is as good as having the factory in thailand, since
they did nothing to create employment for the locals. afterall, it
is the locals who have to pay taxes. not those bangladeshi workers.
not those indonesian maids. not any foreigners, whose low salary
exempts them from income taxes.
when are our politicians ever going to see this existing trend
of negative competition in the work force? alr, 60% of all jobs
last yr went to foreigners.
so will they only do smth if 60% of all parliamentary seats went
over to opposition? or when 60% of our currently overpaid ministers
are replaced with cheap foreign ministers?
