Ever since PAP lost a lot of votes, they seem to be listening better to our voices and implementing more favourable policies.
One of them, Wage Credit, is to help Singapore citizens grow our wages in the private sector.
Click on http://www.iras.gov.sg/irasHome/wcs.aspx
This policy is to ensure that many Singaporeans in the private sector who earn below $4000 per month can be entitled to free money from the PAP, as long as your employer gives you wage increase on a yearly basis.
There is an Wage Credit Calculator online and I computed my figures. If it is true, I should get more than $3000 of free PAP money next year. This is a sizeable amount.
I was earning only $150 per month last year for an NTU graduate. (SPH would love to report that fresh graduates median salary is around S$3000 per month).
I changed job in 2013 and my salary was around $2500 per month.
My salary increase was more than $1000 so my wage credit money is also quite a lot.
However, despite all these free money from PAP, I urge all voters not to be tempted and still vote out PAP. Here's why.
1) Wage Credit is only a temporary measure and not sustainable. Ministry of Finance has already said that this will cease in 2016 which is GE2016. If this is true, we, the citizens of Singapore should not support this as it is considered a form of bribery in the form of Wage Credit.
2) The problem of low wage salaries in private sector will continue to exist even if there is Wage Credit or no Wage Credit. Previously, I blogged about Greedy Bosses and Low Wage Workers. Click on http://therealsingapore.com/content/greedy-bosses-and-low-wage-workers
By using taxpayers money to grow Singapore citizens wages in the private sector will not solve the root of the problem.
The problem lies with bosses who just want to cheapen / short-change our Singapore citizens by depressing our salaries and hiring foreigners who love to work overtime.
Even in my current workplace, we are doing well financially but our salaries gap are huge.
My Managing Director can earn more than $20,000 a month while most of us only earn $2400 a month. The income gap is huge. PAP should focus more on forcing these bosses to equalise this uneven platform.
Our NTUC Unions are ineffective in doing this, so Wage Credit is the only solution without pissing off these bosses.
Even if some good policies have been made so far, there are still many problems still needing to be addressed. We also see that the PAP is more willing to listen when they feel that they might lose more of our votes.
The best way to make the government act more for us is to put more opposition into parliament.
CJ
TRS Contributor