Look at how they implicitly admit they have been discriminating stay-at-home women and older workers in an attempt to cry wolf, that businesses would close shop if we don't get in foreigners (who are going to do the jobs instead of the women and older workers)
Association of Small and Medium Enterprises hits out at Workers' Party population paper
The Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (ASME) has hit out at the Workers' Party's population paper calling it "another blow to the local SME community".
It took issue especially with the WP's proposal to grow the resident workforce by 1 per cent a year by attracting more women and older Singaporeans back to the workforce and to freeze foreign worker numbers at the present level.
Right from the word "go", they shamelessly admit that they are against attracting women and older workers back into the workforce. They are instead, in favour of foreign workers. That's why you see so many foreigners holding jobs our local workers could be doing.
These were among the proposals in the WP's 38-page paper issued on Saturday, which summarises the key arguments made by its Members of Parliament during the Population White Paper debate earlier this month.
On raising resident labour force participation rate, the ASME said: "This is easier said than done as there is an element of mismatch between available jobs and workers' expectations."
You could see many of these jobs are in the customer service line. Talking about mismatch, ya? How many times do you come across seeing the customer service officer could only speak one language, ie Mandarin? Or speak in an accent over the phone you can hardly make out?
So if you talk about mismatch of skills and expectations, who is the mismatch? The local who is able to speak in at least two languages, or the foreigner who speaks in only one, and that one language isn't English!
It added that SMEs have already accepted the government's tightening of the number of foreign workers, but "only to now hear that the WP proposes an even more drastic deceleration".
The association also warned that WP's proposal can lower the overall quality of life for Singaporeans. As more SMEs quit when they cannot hire enough Singaporeans, there will be fewer professional, executive and managerial (PME) jobs, which will in turn hurt Singaporeans as the number of these better-paying jobs shrink. Its bottom line: "ASME supports the view that the government should encourage resident workforce growth, however, not at the expense of simply cutting down to zero foreign workforce growth."
What a wolf cry. All along many businesses have been taking the easy way out. Cheap labour. But this cheap labour has cost productivity to drop too. Mainly in the area of customer satisfaction. Not least of all the inability to communicate in a lingo that the majority of its customers are most comfortable with.
The fact that the SMEs are jumping up and down against WP's suggestion to slow down foreigner intake, shows what we always knew. These SMEs have been deliberately hiring foreigners as cheap labour, never mind their lack of skills and/or competency, compared to the more skilled and competent local stay-at-home women or older workers.
Looks like the ASME, by attacking WP's paper, has unwittingly admitted that SMEs have been doing what they have been denying all along - discrimination against local workers, including women and older workers.
Good work WP. You have caused these hypocrites to panic and they've hit the wrong button, exposing their true selves.
2 comments:
Good Morning Barrie,
To fair to SME's. I do have considerable sympathy for them.
Let us start with a few working assumptions. Is it realistic to curb foreign labor dependence 100% as WP suggested? The short answer is no country in the world can adopt a hermetically closed door policy. As certain category of jobs can never be automated. The hospitality and construction industry are prime examples. Despite great efforts by the Japanese to automate healthcare with robots. Even MITI has concluded that there are real limits.
To put the problem and solution into a working perspective - it is really a matter of balance. And as I mentioned earlier it is FIRST necessary for us to revisit many of our working assumptions.
Firstly, this whole idea of SME's having to close shop and move out of Singapore due to a labor crunch is not something that we should regard negatively. As Barrie, I see this as a very natural cycle of firms that ALL firms have to go through at some stage in their business evolution.
Even Boeing Aeroplane Group that is based in Seattle has had to resort to this manufacturing strategy to keep their fixed cost from ballooning - hence these days, you will find that the wings are manufactured in Japan, the power train in the EU and avionics is a mix of global vendors - now the question is, does that mean that Boeing is not a basket case?
The answer is no - as what many fail to recognize is the value added jobs which are really at the core competencies of a firm are still kept within the US i.e the capacity to design, test and proof aircrafts.
You will find that if you examine this model, it is even widely deployed by Toyota right down to most world class manufacturing firms.
So when the SME's say that they have to ship out of Singapore - I will simply have to, go ahead! It's good for you!
As their departure will lower the cost of manufacturing generally in Singapore. Since new incumbents can come in. Presently, there are too many sweat shop operations in Singapore. These firms are really trying to do the impossible i.e maintain their manufacturing competitiveness through cost leadership by capitalizing on the opium of cheap labor. How much sense does that make? How sustainable is that model?
In summary, when we hear that firms have to close down and ship out of Singapore. This should really be seen in the correct context - as it is really not such a bad thing for firms. In fact, most manufacturing experts see this as a healthy indication of a firm that is progressing higher in the value added chain. When we see the problem and solution from this vantage - then one can be in a better position to understand why WP's position on zero immigration is really a pipe dream. Along with WHY the fears expressed by the SME's are largely imaginary.
I have to hit the field now. But I will write an article on this subject when I return back in the evening.
Do have a productive week.
Darkness 2013
The government must stop focusing on labour cost alone in the drive to be competitive. Focus on cost of rental, transport and utilities as these are the other major cost components of businesses.
If these other costs are reduced, it will also encourage more entrepreneurship and some of these companies may turn up to be the next “Creative Technology”.
Currently small businesses are too hooked on cheap labour that they have forgotten how to be creative and restructure their business process to make it more attractive to hire Singaporeans (housewife, older workers, unemployed workers and under-employed workers). They are just interested in making more and more money for their firm at the expense of the workers.
Many SMEs are employing their whole family in the company and paying their own family members very high salaries and then squeezing the salaries of the other employees. Hence in may instances, the high total wages for these SMEs are artificial due to such practices.
It is time for the government to call the “BLUFF” by such associations to ask for more foreign workers. If salary of Singaporeans increase by 10% due to the curb of foreign workers, then the effect of any price increases can be cushioned. Keeping salaries of Singaporean low while increasing prices is a recipe for disaster.
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