The ASEAN agreement on the movement of natural persons will take effect next year.
http://cil.nus.edu.sg/rp/pdf/2012%20ASEAN%20Agreement%20on%20the%20Movement%20of%20Natural%20Persons-pdf.pdf
Many years back, such an agreement would be welcomed by Singaporeans, as it gave us the opportunity to tap into opportunities in the neighboring countries.
But this agreement will now pose dangers to Singaporean workers.
Read Leong Sze Hian's view
http://www.tremeritus.com/2014/04/18/is-fcf-even-applicable-for-asean-intra-corporate-transferees/
There was a similar agreement signed with India that brought tens of thousand professionals from India to work in Singapore. It has caused many of our PMETs to be unemployed.
At one time, the Singapore professionals were well trained, hard working and competitive. But this is not the case any more. Why is this the case?
http://cil.nus.edu.sg/rp/pdf/2012%20ASEAN%20Agreement%20on%20the%20Movement%20of%20Natural%20Persons-pdf.pdf
Many years back, such an agreement would be welcomed by Singaporeans, as it gave us the opportunity to tap into opportunities in the neighboring countries.
But this agreement will now pose dangers to Singaporean workers.
Read Leong Sze Hian's view
http://www.tremeritus.com/2014/04/18/is-fcf-even-applicable-for-asean-intra-corporate-transferees/
There was a similar agreement signed with India that brought tens of thousand professionals from India to work in Singapore. It has caused many of our PMETs to be unemployed.
At one time, the Singapore professionals were well trained, hard working and competitive. But this is not the case any more. Why is this the case?
Skills differentiation between nationalities have narrowed.
ReplyDeleteFor a Singaporean, besides skills, the salary is an added disadvantage.Other nationalities are willing to work for lower wages. We do not see Indians & Chinese workers competing in each other's employability in their own countries.
There is a segment that is being paid higher but they have skills & experience that is unique to that particular industry.
For example, in the older days, not many locals were qualified to be pilots. Foreigners from UK,US, Australia were employed to fly our commercial planes.. they enjoyed very high pay. But now it very different because there are lots of local pilots.. and the pay has come down.
In Japan, older workers are offered jobs because the Gov have policies that prevent too may foreign workers to enter and compete. In their case, they do not suffer a great deal in their standard of living despite decades of zero growth.
We are overly pre occupied with growth.. and at all costs. Japan has demonstrated that it can have zero growth for decades and not have lower standards of living.
Hi veronika,
ReplyDeleteYou got a good point on why Japan is so socially stable despite its lost decades.
A big problem i see with locals is most are trained to be sheep via the education system. Foreigners working in SG behave even more like sheep aka obedient when earning S$.
A sheep like working style is a disaster in the making - easily replaceable.
Unfortunately many local pmets who could, have migrated to other countries.
ReplyDelete