Will minimum wage laws work here?

[shinkuaku]

Imo, if the objective is to get more money into everyone's pockets, go for free and easy work life...

If i am working full-time and my company pays me say $2500/mth but only pays me $10 increment yearly, how to improve my life?

Even if i go for courses and upgrade my skills like there is no tomorrow, can they still give me $10 increment yearly? Yup, nothing is stopping them, and worst thing is, they will fire me if i work part-time to get more income.

Solution: Recommend companies to remove the restrictions on employees to work part-time after work, as long as they have enough rest for the full-time job the next day.

We are hardworking guys, army trained anyway, so why restrict us from making more $ when you guys can't give us the $ needed to even cover inflation?

 

[arm4da]

2.5 chicken rice from ananas cafe cmi la

CMI, but still food right. you try and find food for <S$5 in another "first world" country

Where to find sia

hawker centres in the heartlands

 

[UlcerLord]

It's not about whether IF it works or not, but rather HOW you want to implement it to work with the correctly thought-out policies to support it.

Minimum wage is not a magical pill that work wonders by itself but if properly administered, will produce immense positive impact for the people.

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/6/silicon-valleya-sminimumwagesuccessstory.html

To claim it doesn't work without the least bit of planning and trying, and to spread message that it will bankrupt the Nation is just fear mongering to keep status quo.

 

[fox1]

By the way, implementing minimum wage not only affects locals or Singaporeans.
It also affects other countries citizens -- tourism being one of them.

Minimum wage raises the over cost of the country, tourists find it harder to stretch their dollar, they go somewhere else.

 

[tsuyuri]

By the way, implementing minimum wage not only affects locals or Singaporeans.
It also affects other countries citizens -- tourism being one of them.

Minimum wage raises the over cost of the country, tourists find it harder to stretch their dollar, they go somewhere else.

we already have another system for minimum wage which is called workfare, but it is not enough to deal with the rising cost of living.

and minimum wage doesn't mean that lower income get an instant 50% increase. numbers need to be slowly adjusted.

 

[ahgohgoh]

Let me put a nail to this coffin. I am sick of hearing people saying rot about how populist, myopic measures like Minimum Wage will "help the poor" or how "sinkies must help sinkies"

1. Minimum Wage is a broad net to ensure workers get a certain $ per hour.

2. This will invariably rise to cost pressures for businesses. Note that the bedrock of our economy are SMEs. With high rental fees, our businesses will be further stretched.

3. If you apply Minimum Wage to all, even Foreign Workers will be entitled to it. We simply cannot afford it.. Do you want your healthcare costs to further spike? A large part of healthcare workforce comes from 3rd world countries.

4. If you apply Minimum Wage to only Singaporeans, employers will be forced to either employ even Foreigners or resort to some form of automation (not
billion dollar Robots)
Automation is actually encouraged by the government. Automation is good. But minimum wage will apply across the board, meaning a rise in cost without rise in productivity. In fact, productivity could fall because there is no pressure for individual to improve.

5. Our country is small, with no natural resources. We survive because of our competitive edge. Minimum Wage wipes off that form of competitiveness.

Totally agree. Minimum wages only work together with other policies like imposing compulsory salary cut off the top and perhaps depressing rental. Without other imposed policies, minimum wages will choke some businesses out of their breath, unless they increase prices. The result of minimum wages could be inflation of common goods across the board.

6. Minimum Wage should not be the target of our generation.. If you are already earning "minimum wage", you should further upgrade your skills / qualifications to earn more than that.

7. " but it helps the poor". This argument holds no water. If you want to help the destitute (eg, family with disabled adults and young schooling children), applying broad minimum wage results in very little direct financial assistance to the intended family. What you should do is have higher taxes for people like Gerald Giam and offer direct subsidies / handouts for families via means testing.

8. Minimum Wage is an extremely myopic but populist campaign topic. It has been used ad nauseum overseas.

9. We are not a resource rich state like Scandinavia or Australia. We simply cannot afford to have minimum wage and YET survive when our ASEAN neighbors are clawing ahead.


10. Before someone kpkb say only PAP ibs put down minimum wage, I am a WP supporter in aljunied for the longest time but I have faith WP core cadre will not support this stupid Gerald Giam's lofty dreams.

Sent from yo momma using GAGT

Actually need statistics like which industry still give out wages below $1000. I believe it's a minority. Perhaps only the cleaners (?), but I see that their productivity is really low. (But I think there was some implementation on minimum wages of cleans recently?)

 

[ahgohgoh]

we already have another system for minimum wage which is called workfare, but it is not enough to deal with the rising cost of living.

and minimum wage doesn't mean that lower income get an instant 50% increase. numbers need to be slowly adjusted.

The underlying issue is really rental and property price, IMO.

But opposition all say it's the foreign influx, which I don't really agree.

 

[fox1]

we already have another system for minimum wage which is called workfare, but it is not enough to deal with the rising cost of living.

How is workfare minimum wage?

 

[UlcerLord]

By the way, implementing minimum wage not only affects locals or Singaporeans.
It also affects other countries citizens -- tourism being one of them.

Minimum wage raises the over cost of the country, tourists find it harder to stretch their dollar, they go somewhere else.

It would be sad to think that our main attraction for tourist to come here is because it is cheap. We can't fight our neighboring countries over "cheapness".
There's a reason why tourists flock to places like europe, japan, maldive, etc. annually and they are in no way cheap.

 

[fox1]

Actually need statistics like which industry still give out wages below $1000. I believe it's a minority. Perhaps only the cleaners (?), but I see that their productivity is really low. (But I think there was some implementation on minimum wages of cleans recently?)

Gov has the Progressive Wage Model where employees get training to move up in salary.
Increase productivity together with salary.

Gov encourages automation to relieve pressure on manpower needs (population issue) and efficiency (productivity).

Then there's skillsfuture funding to train workers for future/near future employment needs.

I would say every policy the gov makes are linked with other policies.
No one policy can stand alone.

 

[dark_aLLeY]

we already have another system for minimum wage which is called workfare, but it is not enough to deal with the rising cost of living.

and minimum wage doesn't mean that lower income get an instant 50% increase. numbers need to be slowly adjusted.

Workfare is not minimum wage. It is subjective to conditions.

There is mimimum wage for S-pass and E-pass holders though.

 

[fox1]

It would be sad to think that our main attraction for tourist to come here is because it is cheap. If can't fight our neighboring countries over "cheapness".
There's a reason why tourists flock to places like europe, japan, maldive, etc. annually and they are in no way cheap.

Singapore is a small urbanised city state.
You compare with Japan, Europe -- 4 seasons, long culture, mountains etc
Maldives -- Singapore has clear blue water for diving???


How to compare???
That's why gov is spending money doing F1, Olympics, MICE etc.
To attract tourists dollars.

 

[stresskiddo]

It's not about whether IF it works or not, but rather HOW you want to implement it to work with the correctly thought-out policies to support it.

Minimum wage is not a magical pill that work wonders by itself but if properly administered, will produce immense positive impact for the people.

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/6/silicon-valleya-sminimumwagesuccessstory.html

To claim it doesn't work without the least bit of planning and trying, and to spread message that it will bankrupt the Nation is just fear mongering to keep status quo.

Yeah kinda agree, we already have minimum wage for S pass and E pass holders in place right ? it serves it a purpose by allowing local PMET wages to not be depressed too much by cheap foreign talent . Well its something worth exploring and lets not dismiss it as a whole

 

[dark_aLLeY]

Minimum Wage Mythbusters, by US dept of Labor.

http://www.dol.gov/minwage/mythbuster.htm

 

[vinn]

Workfare is not minimum wage. It is subjective to conditions.

There is mimimum wage for S-pass and E-pass holders though.

u know wat r e and s passes or not?
and why there need to be a minimum wage for them or not?

 

[overman]

Gov has the Progressive Wage Model where employees get training to move up in salary.
Increase productivity together with salary.

Gov encourages automation to relieve pressure on manpower needs (population issue) and efficiency (productivity).

Then there's skillsfuture funding to train workers for future/near future employment needs.

I would say every policy the gov makes are linked with other policies.
No one policy can stand alone.

The median wage of cleaners in the civil service was between S$675 and S$950 prior to the introduction of the Progressive Wage Model.

But now hor the Progressive wage model ups entry level wages for cleaners to $1000-1200.

This results in less profits for the cleaning companies. And will cause cleaners to be unemployed/replaced by automation. Also as this progressive wage model is introduced to other industries with low wage workers, will result in costs of living in Singapore going up. I.E your $5 chicken rice example.

The free market should decide. If 675 is the market rate then the govt should not interfere.

What if the market rate for the supervisor level is only 1.2k? Setting it at $1.6k will make the SME's suffer.

 

[dark_aLLeY]

u know wat r e and s passes or not?
and why there need to be a minimum wage for them or not?

A criteria for foreigners to work in Sg as blue/white collars.

S-pass minimum wage - 2,200.
E-pass minimum wage - 3,300.

 

[bakuten]

Reposted from another thread.


Low wages is a symptom of:

1. Overregulation of rules and laws like licensing etc to benefit the cronies and drive out their competition.

2. Underregulation of FT imports.

3. Debasement of SGD.

4. Artificially helping lousy SMEs to survive by giving handouts like the PIC grants etc. Which shrinks the market pie for newcomers in the market should these lousy SMEs be allowed to die naturally.




Until u fix the above 4 problems. Raising the minimum wage is just a band aid...and sooner or later u will have a bigger problem on ur hand.

Think about it....if you think companies right now is profitting off the poor....why dont they pay them $1 an hour? Why pay $2.50? Companies arent the problem. The ones setting the rules in the govt are. Low wages are just a symptom of a much bigger problem!
Plastering a bandaid over a gaping wound is not gonna stop it from bleeding man...it could even lead to infections.

 

[ahgohgoh]

Yeah kinda agree, we already have minimum wage for S pass and E pass holders in place right ? it serves it a purpose by allowing local PMET wages to be not be depressed too much by cheap foreign talent . Well its something worth exploring and lets not dismiss it as a whole

S pass should be linked to qualifications, not wages.

Nobody said this in rally ah?

 

[vinn]

A criteria for foreigners to work in Sg as blue/white collars.

S-pass minimum wage - 2,200.
E-pass minimum wage - 3,300.

ya lah. it will make employer think twice, heart pain abit.
if no min wage for these passes, companies can hire cheap labour pmet
much more easily.
i am not saying cheap foreigner pmet is not a problem right now.

these mass import of cheap foreigner pmet are wat we fighting against.