2009: Employment in Tribulation

"What a year it had been! What a ride! JobsDB Malaysia looks back at the year that was filled with drama, tension, stress and many without employment. And what is there in store for 2010?".

It would be an understatement to say that the ye ar 2009 was eventful, namely negative as far as employment is concerned as the end of 2008 confirmed that the United States was indeed in recession and the entire globe would be in mess economically.

At the beginning of the year, the Human Resource Minister,  Datuk S. Subramaniam noting that 45,000 workers laid off temporarily, meaning that they are to take extended leave for festive seasons without pay, were from the electronics sector from Penang, Selangor and Johor.

On the month of January alone 10,000 went jobless according to the Malaysian Employers Federations and a grimmer picture was painted by the Manpower Department which anticipated that some 100,000 were to be retrenched by April.

To counter this, the labour department promised to secure jobs for the earlier mentioned temporarily laid off electronics sector worker, with the Human Resources Ministry (HRM) getting assurance from 120 workers, while the government itself came forward with offering jobs in the teaching profession and the police force. In fact, HRM has made it easier by removing the traditional red tapes and making it easier by holding open interviews.

Meanwhile, things got harsher when news of around 80,000 were said to be laid off till March 2009, announced by Subramaniam, who later put his ministry up to the task when he announced free skills training for retrenched worker. It offered RM500 to RM3, 000 to the participants at the Industrial Training Institutes. Unfortunately, the response was disappointing as the minister kept pointing out month after month.
 
The trouble was bigger with our neighbour,  the very US dependent Singapore where many Malaysians were working, but Subramaniam reassured that Malaysians would be the last to be retrenched as our workers had more skills and abilities as required by Singaporean industry. “When it comes to retrenching foreign workers, the Singapore government has maintained a policy of putting Malaysian workers at the bottom of the list,” he said.
 
To soften the impact, HRM also offered additional jobs including police or armed forces personnel’s, through JobsMalyasia, HRM’s online job search centre.
 
In a survey undertaken by JobsDB, a regional online jobs site, employers were seen as not as drastic as they were mostly pictured. Most decided not to retrench their staff members, in fact 65% employers (responses from more than 100 countries over 36 business sectors) said there were no changes in their compensation and benefits packages. 47% of the companies maintained performance or year end bonuses to their staff at the end of 2008.
 
Additional survey by the company also noted that 50% of the job seekers surveyed (from 657 of its online members) revealed that they are planning to change jobs during the second half of 2009. It noted that the respondents companies have taken other cost cutting elements like reduction of allowances, daily expenses, etc.
 
In the middle of the year,  hopes came floating when the International Monetary Fund, echoing many other authorities, said the worst of the global economy could actually be over. Its First Deputy Managing Director John Lipsky pointed out the oil price climb at that time, and that it reflected, “A general improvement in sentiment on signs that the sharpest period of decline in the global economy is over”. Or in plain talk, “things are looking better”.
 
Back home things were showing improvement. The HR minister said there were no extraordinary increases in the number of employees retrenched, and as a matter of fact the reverse was true. “There have also been requests for recruiting more workers. This is a very healthy sign,” said Subramaniam. A recount took place in the Manpower Department who noted that 37,000 Malaysians have lost job since August last year (excludes temporary lay offs).
 
Edging towards end of the year, the Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Najib, presented a RM191.5 billion budget, which he describes as “painless”. Targeted generally on Malaysian’s “Well being”, the budget is a tenth less than the budget for 2009.

Adding to that, the recently concluded Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Forum saw its member countries making that point. In a joint statement by the member ministers, APEC noted that the recovery remain fragile, unemployment remains unacceptably high in many of our economies.
 
Overall the number of retrenched workers dropped to 641 in August 2009, compared to the peak of 8,383 a year ago according to the Economic report 200/2010 by the Finance ministry. The report added that major manufacturing sectors in the country such as the electrical and electronics (E&E) industry reported improvement in sales orders and had started to re-hire workers.
 
The report also said the unemployment rate increased to 3.6% (3.3% in 2008) in the second quarter of 2009 but the labour market was expected to improve with employment increasing 0.1% in 2009 to 11.6 million workers. Job vacancies for the first 8 months of 2009 increased by 25.9% to 884,437 it said.
 
If the words authorities were to be taken seriously, there is hope in 2010.  Watch this space and keep visiting JobsDB Malaysia’s website. We may have better news for you. Happy Holliday.