PAP Spin - PMET jobs will move offshore because of our policies

[winnipegjets]

By Melissa Tan
The Straits Times
Thursday, Feb 28, 2013

The Government is clamping down on some S Pass holders, a category of mid-tier foreign workers earning less than Employment Pass holders but more than Work Permit holders.

Quotas for these workers will be cut for the services sector and S Pass criteria will be tightened, Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said on Monday.
Eligibility requirements for Employment Pass holders will also be tightened.

Mr Tharman, who is also Finance Minister, said the services sector's S Pass Dependency Ratio Ceiling (DRC) will be cut from 20 per cent to 15 per cent.

The reduction applies to new applicants from July 1 this year.

For existing permit holders and renewals, the new S Pass DRC takes effect on July 1, 2015.

The minimum S Pass qualifying monthly salary will also be raised from $2,000 to $2,200 on July 1 this year, Mr Tharman said.

He added that the Government would introduce a tiered salary system based on an S Pass applicant's age and qualifications.
Older applicants will need to qualify at higher salaries.

"This will help to level the playing field for our local workers in the same jobs and also nudge employers to bring in better-calibre workers."

As for Employment Passes, the Manpower Ministry will continue to tighten eligibility requirements, particularly for Q1 pass holders, Mr Tharman said.

Noting that the total number of Employment Pass holders fell last year, he said the Employment Pass policy "must ensure that firms in Singapore remain able to recruit the best teams, including both locals and foreigners".

"At the same time, we must maintain a level playing field for Singaporeans with respect to jobs and progression opportunities."

The minimum salary for Q1 pass holders, the lowest rung of Employment Pass holders, was increased by $200 to $3,000 on Jan 1 last year. Older applicants have to earn even more to qualify.

Mr Tharman said that this tightening has already led to more foreign employees falling to within the S Pass category which makes them subject to a DRC and levies.

For the longer term, the ministry will also put in place a framework to ensure that firms give fair consideration to Singaporeans in their hiring practices, he added.

Software translation firm Verztec chief executive Nicholas Goh said the measures would pose a challenge for his firm.
The firm employs 45 people, of whom 16 are foreign workers. Five of those are S Pass holders from countries such as Myanmar, Malaysia and Indonesia, while the rest hold Q1 Employment Passes.


"We may have to move some parts of our business overseas... we need specialised knowledge and the reduction makes it harder for us to bring on board people of such talent."


Verztec needs foreign workers for technical work since Singaporeans prefer managerial positions, Mr Goh said.

 

[winnipegjets]

The minimum S Pass qualifying monthly salary will also be raised from $2,000 to $2,200 on July 1 this year, Mr Tharman said. The minimum salary for Q1 pass holders, the lowest rung of Employment Pass holders, was increased by $200 to $3,000

Token changes will not make any difference. It is still a cheap foreign labour policy. If the PAP government is serious in wanting to level the playing field, then it should also impose a ban on foreigners remitting money out of the country and require the foreign employee and employers to pay amount equal to CPF contributions, on top of the levy. The money collected will be designated solely for skills development of sinkees.

Software translation firm Verztec chief executive Nicholas Goh said the measures would pose a challenge for his firm.
The firm employs 45 people, of whom 16 are foreign workers. Five of those are S Pass holders from countries such as Myanmar, Malaysia and Indonesia, while the rest hold Q1 Employment Passes.
"We may have to move some parts of our business overseas... we need specialised knowledge and the reduction makes it harder for us to bring on board people of such talent."
Verztec needs foreign workers for technical work since Singaporeans prefer managerial positions, Mr Goh said.

Verztec is a SME that is not worth supporting. 35 percent of its headcount are cheap foreign labour and his excuse was that sinkees prefer managerial jobs. So, his company has 16 specialist and 29 managers! Pure bs, there are lots of graduate sinkees who would take jobs that pay $2-3k. He is just unwilling to take sinkees on because he can't exploit them like he could with foreigners.

 

[ChaoPappyPoodle]

Every country in the world except Singapore has strict immigration laws for foreign workers. Only the BASTERD PAPzis don't have one. Why are other countries not facing widespread loss of jobs and a lower quality of life in the past 15 years from their strict immigration laws on foreign workers?

With under table money rampant, the increase in levies is nothing but a pathetic and cosmetic policy that fails to address true hardships that have fallen on low and middle income Singapore due to the PAPzis progressive immigration laws where we have seen foreigner's being given advantageous positions to garner jobs in Singapore.

 

[Dreamer1]

I saw one stupid SME boss declarding on TV last nite that it would come down to cost,that is to con the Ah Bens & Ah Lians,but somehow those very smart Alexs in PAP graduating from IVY or OxBridge seem to fall for this stupid talk.I suspect that it is a Western Consipracy they trained PAP guys diuifferently,probably by a Mark of the beast to identify them as PAPies.

 

[depeche]

The government are clamping on the FT policy now so that the target of 6.9M would be reached by 2030 instead of 2020.

 

[winnipegjets]

The government are clamping on the FT policy now so that the target of 6.9M would be reached by 2030 instead of 2020.

And when the foreign population hits 3.9 million by 2019 ...LHL will say 'I am sorry, we did not anticipate that sinkapore would be so attractive despite our clamdown. Our Immigration IT system which was developed by foreign talents had a minor glitch. Nonetheless, sinkees are resilient. Let's move on'.

 

[greenies]

Ha ha...

If they take responsibilities and gracefully resigned from post when they made mistake, those kinds of policies would never be implemented.

Now they just tell "move on", "no 20-20 sight", blah blah...
How on earth they approved themselves to earn million dollars salaries plus pension, but they shamefully avoid to take accountability for the wrong things.

That is why I feel that their moral leadership is gone down to drain.
Only opportunists and no brainers follow their leadership.
Smart, fair and confident people avoid joining their ranks.

And when the foreign population hits 3.9 million by 2019 ...LHL will say 'I am sorry, we did not anticipate that sinkapore would be so attractive despite our clamdown. Our Immigration IT system which was developed by foreign talents had a minor glitch. Nonetheless, sinkees are resilient. Let's move on'.

 

[tanwahtiu]

It took 20 years of tax payers money of each country to produce 1 IT worker would it be unfair to the other country to lose their IT workers? If PAP keeps recruiting low wage workers to Sin then their country will be half empty, and also stealing their talents.

 

[The_Hypocrite]

It does not matter if such PMET jobs move out. They dont go to locals anyway n it just enrich the fucked up sme bosses which could b fts. So i rather they pack up and go.

 

[andyfisher]

As someone who is a SME man since donkey years.

I do agree that cost is a major issue, it is very important, especially in spore where competition can be very fierce and undercutting is not uncommon.

But having said that, it is not the only factor, if a biz competes only on price, sure mati one.

Your service must also be kilat. Your work must be kilat, the customer must like you, you must be reliable (very important), cannot be fly by night kind, etc etc.
Big clients want products/service at a good price, but they also want good service and trouble free relationship.

And it is bs to say sporeans only want to be mgr, you first have to know the work before can be mgr.

If pappys base their econ policies on cuckoo theories like this, we will always be stuck in this vicious circle of import labour, depress wages and make ordinary people's lives hard.