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SINGAPORE: Around 52,000 Singaporeans earn less than S $ 1,300 per month, including Workfare cash supplements and after deducting contributions to the Central Provident Fund (CPF), the Chief Minister of State for the Manpower, Zaqy Mohamad, in Parliament.
The figure includes 30,000 full-time Singaporean employees working in areas such as food services, cleaning and retail, and 22,000 self-employed workers, Zaqy said in response to opposition MP Jamus Lim, who asked how many Singaporeans made less than S $ 1,300 a month. .
Four in five of these Singaporeans have up to post-secondary qualifications and more than a third of them are 50 years or older, reflecting that low-wage workers tend to be older and have a lower educational profile compared to the current generation said Mr. Zaqy.
According to Mr. Zaqy, low-wage workers also receive other types of government support, including GST vouchers and financial assistance from ComCare.
He said Singapore follows the International Labor Organization (ILO) definition of income, which includes employee contributions to social security and pension plans.
Therefore, the calculations should consider contributions from CPF and Workfare, as they can be used for health care and housing needs, he said.
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Workfare is a plan introduced in 2007, which offers low-income Singaporeans cash payments and CPF recharges to encourage them to keep working and saving for retirement.
“I think it’s worth noting that 75 percent of our Workfare recipients, low-income workers, also own their own homes, and therefore there is a direct impact of CPF on their home ownership,” Zaqy said, adding that most overseas minimum wage systems, including the United States and the United Kingdom, are subject to taxes and social security contributions.
Sengkang GRC MP Dr Lim replied: “The ILO has a particular definition, but I am sure you will also appreciate that a worker working full time in Singapore will have a notion of how much their work effort is worth every month. ”.
READ: The government launches a task force to analyze the wages and well-being of low-wage workers
In Parliament, Zaqy also lobbied Dr. Lim to clarify the Workers’ Party’s position on the minimum wage level, as it did not seem clear whether it was a gross or net minimum wage of S $ 1,300 that the party he was proposing based on his manifesto and recent parliamentary speeches.
Dr. Lim said his question was not about the minimum wage but about the take-home wage, “partly because it’s about what it means for survival.”
Despite this, Mr. Zaqy asked Dr. Lim to explain WP’s minimum wage standards.
“Can I just confirm once more that the Workers’ Party reference minimum wage of S $ 1,300 is gross income so that we can figure this out and come to an understanding?” he said.
Dr. Lim said at first that it was correct and a “fair characterization”, but later said that WP’s position was that the minimum wage of S $ 1,300 meant net pay.
TARIFF RECIPIENTS
In response to a separate question from MP Liang Eng Hwa about the number of Workfare recipients, Mr. Zaqy said that an average of around 400,000 people received an average of S $ 1,560 annually through Workfare in the last three years. The maximum payment was S $ 3,600.
Older workers tend to make up the majority of program beneficiaries: 49% of them are 60 years or older and 18% are between 55 and 59 years, compared to 21% between 45 and 54 and 11% between 35 and 44 years old. , he said.
“The government will continue to provide comprehensive support to low-wage workers,” he said.
“In addition to Workfare and the schemes already mentioned, there are also efforts to raise the standard of living for low-wage workers in other significant ways, such as providing access to quality health care, grants, and improved housing grants to help them be owners of their own homes, education for their children and adequate support in their retirement ”.
