Layoffs spike in 4Q15 to 4,200 amidst business restructuring
Singapore Business Review – 6 hours ago
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Employment growth at 12-year low last year: Manpower MinistryReply
The overall unemployment rate for 2015 remained low at 1.9%, but total employment growth was just 0.9% - the lowest year-on-year growth since 2003, according to the Ministry of Manpower. Mr Lim Swee Say says the workforce will continue to grow but at a slower pace of about 1% from 2016 to 2020.
By Calvin Hui
Posted 28 Jan 2016 10:45 Updated 28 Jan 2016 21:02
SINGAPORE: While the unemployment rate in Singapore remained low last year, total employment growth slowed to a 12-year low with just 31,800 jobs added, according to preliminary estimates released by the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) on Thursday (Jan 28).
The overall unemployment rate in 2015 was 1.9 per cent - broadly unchanged since 2011 - with the unemployment rate for residents at 2.8 per cent and for citizens at 2.9 per cent, the ministry said.
However, total employment growth for the year slowed to 0.9 per cent - the lowest year-on-year growth since 2003, MOM said.
Employment of locals increased marginally by 100 in 2015, after growing strongly by 96,000 in 2014. The numbers largely reflect the exit of casual workers in retail trade, and slowdown in sectors such as manufacturing (including marine) and real estate services, the ministry said. This was partially offset by job growth in sectors such as administrative and support services, community, social and personal services, professional services as well as financial and insurance services.
Foreign employment, excluding foreign domestic workers, moderated last year, growing by 22,600 or 2 per cent. This is slightly lower than 2014, but significantly lower when compared to levels in 2011 to 2013, MOM said.
LOCAL WORKFORCE WILL GROW AT SLOWER PACE: LIM SWEE SAY
Looking ahead, the local workforce will continue to grow but at a slower pace as more baby boomers approach retirement age, Manpower Minister Lim Swee Say said at a media briefing on Thursday.
He projected that growth would moderate to about 1 per cent over the next five years, from 2016 to 2020.
The growth of the foreign workforce in Singapore, on the other hand, will taper to about 2 per cent over the next five years, according to the minister.
As such, total workforce growth will be at around 1 to 2 per cent, and this is unlikely to change beyond the next five years, he added.
"TURN HUMAN RESOURCES INTO HUMAN CAPITAL"
Mr Lim said given the slow projected workforce growth, it was crucial for Singapore to turn its human resources into human capital by finding ways to improve the labour force participation rate.
Possible ways to do this were job redesign, flexi-work arrangements and extending the reemployment age, he said.
He also said it was important for the economy to become more manpower-lean while simultaneously increasing productivity.
“If Singapore-based enterprises cannot grow profitably, eventually we are going to see a holding out of certain sectors of the economy," he said.
"The job growth will slow down but we hope that the quality should continue to improve. And this would mean good jobs and better careers for the workforce.”
Mr Lim added that his focus will be on the “double weak” - companies which are weak in the Singaporean core and are not contributing much to the economy.
"So within the sector, you may have certain pockets of the sub-sectors, whereby the Singaporean core is weak - they are dominated mainly by foreign manpower. And yet at the same time, their impact - their economic impact, social impact - may not necessarily be very strong," he explained.
"So if that's the case, shouldn't we adopt a tighter policy? If you are mainly employing foreigners, at the same time they're not making a significant contribution to the economy and society, then what is your role here?"
Ricky L • Remove
"So within the sector, you may have certain pockets of the sub-sectors, whereby the Singaporean core is weak - they are dominated mainly by foreign manpower. And yet at the same time, their impact - their economic impact, social impact - may not necessarily be very strong," he explained.
"So if that's the case, shouldn't we adopt a tighter policy? If you are mainly employing foreigners, at the same time they're not making a significant contribution to the economy and society, then what is your role here?"
The above statement by MOM Minister Lim Swee Say - is the most spectacular help extended to Singaporean PMETs.
If these companies only employed foreigners and not Singaporean PMETs and the Singapore Economy - why are they here?
Ricky L • Remove
Posted in :-
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
ricky l
0users liked this commentThumbs UpThumbs Down0users disliked this commentRicky L • a second agoRemove
Thus it is a unhealthy situation for our workforce to be overwhelm by foreigners. Companies are seen to be staffed by 40%, 50% and some are even 70% made up of foreigners.
The implication is that it will cause :-
(1) Security & safety problem - if some foreigners have their own agenda that compromise Singapore security and safety such as those past examples that Singapore experienced above.
(2) Social problem - where Singaporeans are displaced of their jobs.
Seriously feel that foreigners should supplement Singaporean workforce and not the other way round - as seen in the percentage of the workforce in many companies in Singapore.
About 20% to 30% of foreigners is about right.
Ricky L • Remove
Posted in :-
Wednesday, January 20, 2016
ricky l1 minute ago
10 years ago is where US sub-prime crisis trigger a World Financial crisis that trigger World Economic crisis - that go into a negative territory.
At that time, Banks in US and Europe are laden with bad loans to sub-prime property borrowers, and trigger run on banks and banks collapsed - whereby Government have to pump in taxpayers money to prop up the banks.
Singapore at that time sustain huge investment lost, Economic growth that go into negative terriority, losing jobs and business.
Thus to jumpstart the Economy, drawing into reserves, scheme such as job credit, importing many cheap foreign labours and inviting business investment - is the way to go to ensure the Economy is in the positive territory, business remain viable and jobs can created.
But the import of massive influx of foreigners have whet the appetite of business - who prefer to keep cheap foreign labour - and displaced mature Singaporean PMETs who are more expensive.
Hence now we are stuck at this mode - until the Economy restructure - and we, mature Singaporean PMETs can get a job and Singaporeans become the core workers again with foreigners as supplement - when the Economy successfully restructure and business successfully readjusted. And I believe Government will have a role, duty and responsibility to make this happen.
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MP Patrick Tay proposes limit on PME numbers for firms that do not hire enough Singaporeans
Pedestrians at One Raffles Quay near Shenton Way. PHOTO: ST FILE
PUBLISHED
JAN 29, 2016, 5:00 AM SGT
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Pearl Lee
Companies that do not hire enough Singaporean professionals, managers and executives (PMEs) should be given a limit on the number of foreign professionals they can hire, Mr Patrick Tay (West Coast GRC) said yesterday.
Calling it the PME dependency ratio, he said it is akin to the restrictions employers face for hiring foreigners with low- to mid-level skills. Stricter conditions should also be imposed on these firms when they apply for employment passes for their foreign PMEs, the labour MP said.
At the same time, companies should be encouraged to retrench local PMEs last when they have to downsize. These measures will counter nationality bias in the workplace, which still exists in the IT and financial sectors, and encourage employment of Singaporeans over foreigners, said Mr Tay.
The economy needs to be led by local PMEs in order for them "to fully exploit the labour market and yet be able to fully realise their potential and skills", he said.
Newcomer Saktiandi Supaat (Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC) had similar concerns. More PMEs are approaching the Employment and Employability Institute for help, with 337 people registering for its programmes last year. This is an increase from the 128 in 2014, he noted. Retrenched PMEs often struggle to find jobs that match their last-drawn salaries and they end up with lower-paying jobs, he said.
Mr Saktiandi said PMEs with specialised skills need to be redeployed to suitable fields of work.
Companies also have to be more open to hiring older professionals.
One way he suggested was to match PMEs with small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which make up the majority of companies here. This "makes great sense", he said, as SMEs face high labour costs, manpower shortage and increasing competition.
Ms Lee Bee Wah (Nee Soon GRC) observed that Singaporeans are getting retrenched more often. She proposed a radical idea: each time a company lays off a Singaporean worker, the Government should cancel a work pass given to the firm for hiring a foreign worker.
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