well, there are always arguments on both sides. there always have been, in any country.
since most of the arguments for the "for" side have been presented, here are some for against:
1) people will demand wage differentials; i.e. if you set it at $6/hr as mattlock suggests, then someone who was earning $6/hr will demand that his wage increase too, since someone previously possibly earning $4/hr is earning what he is earning now. and this goes on. the people at $8/hr, will want $10/hr. you get the idea, it doesn't necessarily have to be a $2/hr increase across the board.
2) a simple response to firms used to "cheap labour" is simply to not employ as much labour. and extend working hours of current workers. you can always extend hours unofficially depending on how you see it.. which solves nothing. zero sum game because there are many ways around minimum wage laws, no matter how structured and rigid they get.
3) the resultant falling profits for firms employing "cheap labour" simply leads to a happier outcome for everyone, when even more minimal working training is carried out. instead of the customer service officer who parrots you phrases from a standard phrase book, you're going to get people who don't even seem to know what company they're working for. :bsmilie:
4) small companies who rely on being "immoral" as mattlock sees it will get driven out of business. do not demonise everyone employing cheap labour (waitress, cleaners, delivery personnel).. some of these are just small fry people, not rich towkays growing fat at the expense of malnourished, thin, hungry people.
5) you just worsen the problem of foreign employment.
1) Yup, their manpower costs will increase. But it shouldn't be far from $2 (like someone wanting a $10 raise per hour).
2) That's what labour laws are for (dealing with "unofficial hours" and whatnots), and is not a good response to why we SHOULDN"T have a minimum wage
3) What is your basis for this? Or is this just what you imagine will happen?
4) don't exaggerate. "malnourished, thin, hungry".sheesh. Small businesses usually don't hire that many staff. Staff costs are less an issue than rent. If I raise the staff costs $1000, that's still much less than alot of rent increases over the past 2 years.
But wages haven't risen in tandem with inflation the same way rent has risen exponentially faster than inflation.
5) if you have a minimum wage, then foreign employment becomes less of an issue because they can't undercut (less foreigners with lower standards of living willing to work for less
money)
The thing is we are no longer some backwater country with regards to pay.
aryanto I think that many might actually want to keep the money. I think certain professions will be opposed to raising the monthly income through a minimum wage, due to their heavy reliance on cheap manpower.
such as: cleaning companies, construction industry, maid agencies, some F&B, contractors
But we need to think what are the consequences of not having
As long as we have alot of immigrants coming into Singapore we need to consider that many of them are willing to take low pay just to get a job.and employers will take advantage of that.
And what happens is that after that employers will complain that they find it hard to hire Singaporeans as opposed to foreigners because singaporeans are so "picky". Let's consider the other side of the story that the terms offered by these companies are not feasible for a Singaporean living in Singapore to maintain a decent simply lifestyle, and cannot compete against a guy from China living with a few mates in a 2 bedroom HDB.
So by allowing unrealistically low wages we encourage certain social problems, in terms of a social divide in income, together with an unhappiness towards foreigners who are willing to work cheaply (since most of their money gets remitted back anyway)
A minimum wage is a good way to ensure a certain protection for employees, because if you leave it to employers they will prefer to pay $0 if they could to people. You see this in photography where people are constantly asking for services for free.
I guess the first question to ask is: What is considered a decent amount of money per month to make to survive in Singapore decently (not hand to mouth)
i thot we r all receiving the minimum wage as it is?
