Here is a response to: ‘New citizen Li Yeming now questions FCF‘ The “Fair Consideration Framework” has a large number of flaws, the main one being the lack of a well defined enforcement process. But Li Yeming’s big argument is that since the unemployment rate is low, foreigners are needed and the jobs foreigners take are jobs Singaporeans do not want. (He also makes the weaker argument that very few cases of “unfair” employment practices have been validated by MOM and the perpetrators punished. He is clearly unaware, or probably deliberately feigning unawareness, that many cases turn on he-said-she said and firm evidence like e-mail records are hard to come by. He also states that the label “fair” has unfriendly connotations but I won’t go into that.) However, the fact is that foreign labor, aside from going into jobs Singaporeans traditionally do not take such as construction, also compete for the jobs that Singaporeans want to take such as entry-level IT jobs. With low asking salaries, no requirement for CPF contributions, and lack of reservist liabilities (a major demerit in the private sector unless one’s boss is one of the few who are “committed to National Service”), on the face of things, foreign workers are more attractive. I won’t make a long argument that there is a necessity to protect Singaporeans. Singaporeans, in order to preserve Singapore, have to set up families pay for housing and generally incur a much larger living expense bill. Foreign workers have no comparable pressures and can comfortably ask for a lower salary. This asymmetry is “unfair”. One such as Li Yeming might contend that all is fair in love and the job market. He can contend contentiously to his heart’s content. If Singaporeans are competed out of the workplace, not for lack of ability or unreasonable wage expectations, there will be fewer Singaporean families. And the Singaporean families that do emerge will be less economically healthy on average. This will weaken Singapore. One of the most important pillars of national security is the economic well-being of Singaporeans. It is thus clear that there is a strong national security case for the reasonable protection of Singaporeans in the workplace, Finally, to get to the point in the title, the “unemployment rate” is no measure of actual unemployment. After a certain time lapses in one’s job search, one drops out of the unemployment statistics because one is inferred to “not want to take a job” and to have “dropped out of the labour market”. This unfortunate set accounting method leads to the long/medium-term unemployed being uncounted and overlooked. It also means that the “unemployment rate” overlooks something important. It is a cliche that “what gets measured gets managed”. Consider, also, poverty which has no formal measure. It is easy to administratively overlook the poor and long/medium-term unemployed due to lack of formal measures. But it should be noted that this is not due to malice. (I know many good people in the public service/civil service who care deeply for Singaporeans.) Busy civil servants have enough on their plate dealing with what does get measured. The lack of a measure (and thus a link to KPIs) makes things easy to overlook. This should be rectified. And the simple rectification is to provide a full breakdown of the numbers who have been unemployed for various lengths of time. Apologies for the lack of organization, this was typed out in a bit of a hurry. Jeremy Chen
Posted on: Tue, 03 Dec 2013 12:23:07 +0000
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