In steamy and stormy April, the hottest issue is none other than the rising prices of goods. One might ask: How much is your cup of tea? Or guess how much this plate of lunch costs.
The falling ringgit and rapidly rising prices have all made life tougher for ordinary wage-earners. As if that is not enough, our MPs have demanded higher salaries and allowances.
Even as the public are bosses of this country (which is only true during elections), how could workers ask for a raise when bosses hardly make ends meet? Little wonder they are going to frustrate the bosses for choosing such a bad timing to put forward their proposal.
The goods and services tax (GST) is here to stay. But what the public is confronted with is more than just the GST alone and deliberate price mark-ups. As a matter of fact, the impact from the latter is far more pronounced than conscientious traders collecting taxes on behalf of the government. But, do we have a channel to lodge our complaints?
A cup of coffee or Milo could easily fetch more than RM2, and even a simple plate of lunch could go as high as RM6 or RM7. Everyone brings up his prices but is it all because of GST? I doubt. It won't be easy for the authorities to pick out the unscrupulous traders.
Indeed, prices are automatically raised following the advent of the GST, but the margins are often far higher than 6%. Even if consumers have the choice to buy or not to buy, given the fact that everyone is bringing up his prices, we as consumers have very, very little choice indeed.
The MPs' demand for a pay raise is like rubbing salt into the wound. And some of them even have the guts to say: "Let's talk about this another day. Let's fix the economy first!"
MPs are like ordinary citizens having to dig deep into their pockets to pay for the expenses. While we sympathise with them for not receiving a raise for almost a decade, we nevertheless hope that they should do their jobs properly first before asking for an increment, and even then the margin should be moderate and appropriate. Let's not forget that some of these MPs still have their own sources of income.
Those who perform well should get a raise, and no one is going to contest this, but to give the laggards a raise is most definitely unconvincing.
Our MPs should be put under a meritocracy system not unlike a corporate company. They should go through appraisals like the company staff, and be given salary adjustments based on performance. – mysinchew.com,
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