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THE
National Capital Region (NCR) wage board has decided on
a P20 wage increase for Metro Manila, but this was still
subject to further “refinements” when President Arroyo
announced it around noontime Thursday.
The President was the first to
officially announce the decision of the wage boards on
petitions in the NCR and in Northern Mindanao, at the
29th National Conference of Employers organized by the
Employers Confederation of the Philippines (Ecop) at the
Manila Hotel.
The President said that based on the
report of Labor Secretary Marianito Roque Wednesday
night, the NCR wage board had agreed on a P20 wage
increase in Metro Manila but, at the time, was still
determining whether it would be a P20-minimum wage
addition or a P15-minimum wage addition plus P5 cost of
living allowance.
For Northern Mindanao, she said, that
the regional wage board decided that of the existing P26
Cola, P16 will be part of the integrated minimum wage
while the remaining P10 will be increased by P12,
resulting in a “P12 increase in the take home pay of
workers” in that region.
“So thank you to the wage boards that
have finished their work, and I look forward to the wage
boards in the other regions coming up with their work
soon,” Arroyo said.
The President said that the executive
and the legislative branches have been working on
non-wage benefits to help workers cope with rising
living costs, such as the “swift passage” of the tax
exemption bill for minimum wage-earners earlier passed
by the House of Representatives.
“I understand from our Legislative
Liaison Office that the Senate has a different version
but also a very good version. We hope that whatever
compromise will come out in the Bicameral Conference
Committee will be something that will be good for
employers and good for workers as well,” she said.
Sergio Ortiz-Luis, president of the
Employers Confederation of the Philippines, said
employers will “abide by the decision of the wage
boards” even if some small and medium enterprises (SMEs),
that comprise 97 percent of businesses in Metro Manila,
would have to downsize owing to a P20-wage hike.
“Sad to say, some of them would be
forced to downsize. Some of them, especially the SMEs
who are having difficulty already with the dollar and
the power problem, I’m sure there will be some
casualties also,” Ortiz-Luis said.
He declined to quantify the number of
“casualties” in the SME work force but said that “it
could be thousands.”
“These are small companies. Remember, 97
percent [of enterprises in the NCR are] small and
medium. The 3 percent can afford it. But you have seen
that those who are big are even opposing it. So much
more the small ones,” the Ecop president said.
He said that labor should be happy with
a P20-wage hike, considering that nonwage benefits due
them through legislative and administrative acts would
given them an estimated P65 more, effectively securing
them an P85 augmentation.
Ortiz-Luis said workers’ savings from
the enactment of the measures on cheap medicines and tax
exemption for minimum wage earners, plus the rice
subsidy and condonation of loan penalties from the
Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) and the
Social Security System (SSS) are estimated to total P65
per day.
“The tax break, that is at least P33 a
day. The cheap medicines act, the rice subsidy plus the
GSIS and SSS condonation. So our computation is
basically P65 plus P20. So they would really be getting
P85,” he said. Ortiz-Luis said the legislative and the
executive branches have “chipped in,” in terms of
providing relief for workers, “for the first time,”
unlike in the past when employers had to bear the full
brunt of wage hikes.
“We’re a little lucky now because the
government’s fiscal standing is good so they can afford
all these things. If it were in the past years, I think
we’ll be alone in trying to solve the problems of the
employees,” Ortiz-Luis said. |
