Help govt realise progressive wage policy, Rafizi tells private sector

 

Rafizi Ramli said the old way of managing the economy by only focusing on investments is not viable because it only helps the rich get richer.

ALOR SETAR: The government hopes the private sector will also be committed to helping the government realise its policy of progressive wage increases to parry the rising cost of living.

Economy minister Rafizi Ramli said the government needs a comprehensive policy involving the private and public sectors as it is now the government’s priority to bridge the significant gap between the growth of wages and the increase in the cost of living.

“When I talk about solving the problems of the country’s economic structure, it has to mean raising people’s wages because the growth of people’s wages does not match the increase in the cost of goods.

“Measures to solve the problem of commodity prices and inflation are already in progress, but if the salary does not fluctuate regularly, (in tandem with the increase in the cost of living) it will not be resolved anytime soon,” he said after a Madani Tour programme here last night.

On Friday, it was reported that the government had agreed to review the civil service salary scheme with the Cabinet set to discuss the matter, as the last salary review took place 10 years ago.

Rafizi said the government can no longer manage the economy in the old way by only focusing on investments because the rich will only get richer while wealth growth does not reach the people at large.

“The main focus now is to address extreme poverty, we need to prioritise this issue first by creating more jobs through agriculture and entrepreneurship. Our immediate attention is to address the issue of income,” he said. - FMT