Labor group slams employers seeking wage exemptions: “Wag kayong kuripot”

  

Joey Concepcion, big capitalist and presidential adviser

The labor group Partido Manggagawa (PM) slammed employers for seeking exemption from the recently announced minimum wage hikes as it shouted out to them: “Wag kayong kuripot!” The group called on workers to express outrage as the most vulnerable workers will be left with nothing if the employers get their wish.

 

Sergio Ortiz-Luis Jr., president of the Employers Confederation of the Philippines, Frank Carbon, vice president in the Visayas of the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and Joey Concepcion, Presidential Adviser for Entrepreneurship, all declared that employers will be hit by the pay increases. Last Friday, the Western Visayas regional wage board hiked the minimum wage by P55 to P110. Likewise, the NCR wage board announced a P33 increase, thus raising the minimum wage in Metro Manila to P570. PM had earlier called for a P100 legislated wage hike.

 

“Pera na magiging bato pa. This is what will happen if the employers’ demand for exemption or deferment is granted. The wage hikes are not even enough to recover the value lost to inflation for the past three years. Deferring the pay increase and exempting employers will be rubbing salt on the wound,” declared Rene Magtubo, PM national chair.

 

He added that “Doomsday scenarios of firms going bankrupt, laying off workers and inflation running amok are just the usual disinformation and scare tactics of employers in their class war against a wage increase and a profit decrease. Studies have shown that the employment and inflation effects of wage increases in developing countries are marginal. Employers are being disingenuous in saying that salary hikes will just induce price increases but they are silent on the fact that wages have already been eroded by inflation. Workers are the victims of inflation and wage hikes are not its cause.”

 

The group insisted that the pandemic-induced economic crisis is not an argument against a wage hike. “On the contrary, it is a reason to provide money to consumers through a pay increase. Boosting the purchasing power of consumers—especially lowly paid workers who spend most of their take-home pay compared to high income earners—will pump prime the economy and lead to the revival of MSMEs.”

 

PM pointed out that a MSME with 10 workers, will only incur an additional P330 in daily wage costs or P8,580 in monthly labor expenses which translates to a mere 0.3% of its P3 million asset size. “This will definitely not bankrupt an MSME. But a lack of market because of low consumption will kill an MSME. A wage hike will create a virtuous cycle in the economy. Capitalists simply do not want to share the profit they have accumulated through the decade and a half of sustained economic growth,” Magtubo expounded.

May 18, 2022

“Wag kang kuripot”—labor group to Joey Concepcion

Photo from Manila Bulletin 

 

The labor group Partido Manggagawa (PM) called out presidential adviser for entrepreneurship Joey Concepcion for opposing the demand for a wage hike. “Wag kang kuripot! Workers have been waiting for two to three years already for a minimum wage hike. Asking them to wait for the possible suspension of the excise tax betrays the greedy capitalist in Joey Conception,” stated Rene Magtubo, PM national chair and Marikina City councilor.

 

The group asserted that even small businesses can afford to give their workers a pay increase. “Before the pandemic, businesses, both big and small, accumulated revenues and profit without sharing the productivity gains to their workers. From 2001 to 2016, the economy doubled in size and productivity increased by 50% but real wages remained stagnant. The pie became larger but the slice of workers remained the same. Employers pocketed the productivity gains accruing from the blood and sweat of workers,” explained Magtubo.

 

PM had earlier called for a P100 legislated wage hike even as Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello asked the regional wage boards to review the possibility of a minimum pay hike. The group is asking that the proposed emergency session of Congress tackle a legislated wage hike.

 

“Numerous studies suggest that minimum wage hikes do not lead to increases in unemployment nor prices. Inflation and retrenchments are just convenient bogeys for government and employers to scare the public against a wage hike,” Magtubo clarified.

 

He added that “P100 is just a wage recovery not a real increase in salaries. From 2018 to the present, real wages have declined by a significant amount of 8%. The National Wages and Productivity Commission’s own data shows that as of February 2022, the P537 minimum wage in Metro Manila is worth only P494 due to inflation since 2018.”

 

“The economic slump is not an argument against a pay increase. Instead it is a reason to provide money to consumers through a wage hike. Boosting the purchasing power of consumers—especially lowly paid workers who spend most of their take-home pay compared to high income earners—will pump prime the economy and lead to the revival of MSMEs,” Magtubo averred.

 

PM pointed out that a MSME with 10 workers, will only incur an additional P1,000 in daily wage costs which translates to 10% of its P 3 million asset size. “This will definitely not bankrupt an MSME. But a lack of market because of low consumption will kill an MSME. A wage hike will create a virtuous cycle in the economy. Capitalists just do not want to share the profit they have accumulated through a decade and a half of sustained economic growth,” Magtubo expounded.

March 14, 2022

Workers slam “Balik Probinsya” scheme in online Labor Day protest

As locked down workers in the Philippines and the world celebrated May 1 in online actions, the labor group Partido Manggagawa (PM) slammed Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello’s push for a “Balik Probinsya” scheme.

“The ‘balik probinsya’ plan of Sec. Bello and the ‘balik trabaho’ proposal of Presidential Adviser Joey Concepcion are both hare-brained pro-capitalist schemes. Labor was not consulted in Bello’s rehash of Bong Go’s plan while Concepcion’s GoNegosyo proposal will endanger workers’ lives. Workers will be sent to the provinces where wages are dirt cheap and will be sent back to work since they are allegedly immune so capitalists can earn bigger profits immediately,” stated Rene Magtubo, PM national chair.

Both proposals are in direct contradiction to the demands being put forward by organized labor in today’s online protest. PM and the labor coalition Nagkaisa are asking workers to make selfies while holding placards with demands and to post it in social media accounts using the hashtags #AyudangSapatParaSalahat, #BalikTrabahongLigtas, #MakataongTugonHindiMilitarisasyon and #MayDay2020.

“A proper response to the covid pandemic should put the needs of the workers and poor first not the interests of capitalists in front and center,” Magtubo averred.

The group is also alarmed at the rise in the number of cases involving cruel treatment by security forces against violators of quarantine protocols and warns against a new normal of impunity. PM cited the police dispersal of a workers’ picketline in Cavite during Black Friday night. Dasmarinas police who refused to give their names threatened two strikers—at the Sejung Apparel Inc. factory in the First Cavite Industrial Estate—with arrest for allegedly violating the quarantine rules.

“Labor rights are not suspended during the ECQ and this incident breaks all the rules of engagement, especially the guidelines on the conduct of security personnel during labor disputes,” Magtubo insisted.

He added that “Workers hold no nostalgia for the old normal of neoliberal capitalism characterized by insecure work, cheap wages, permanent joblessness, privatized services and lack of protection. But we will fight any plot by capitalists and the government to shape a new normal where workers are in worse conditions than before.”

“Instead the working class imagine the new normal as a system where workers are valued for their wealth-creating labor and the people enjoy by right the things necessary for a decent life—full employment, a living wage, universal health care, quality education, social protection and a clean environment, a voice in their workplaces and society as a whole, among others,” Magtubo concluded. 

May 1, 2020