PM confirms gov't mulling salary subsidy to keep jobs among locals

Prime Minister Dr Mahathir Mohamad today acknowledged that a proposal has been made to the cabinet on the possibility of introducing a salary subsidy for local youths including fresh graduates.

Mahathir said the proposal was intended to address the issue of foreigners occupying certain jobs as locals are unwilling to take them up, in part due to the low salaries.

"Yesterday, we discussed the issue of migrant workers that come to our country in large numbers.

"They come because our own people are unwilling to work. One of the possible reason is that the wages for these jobs are not that high," he said.

However, he said if employers were to give high salaries, it could lead to the prices of goods skyrocketing rendering them uncompetitive against imported good.

"Therefore, certain quarters have made a suggestion that we provide an indirect subsidy.

"In this way, wages can go up and our own workers can take up those jobs instead of relying on foreigners," he said.

Mahathir also said the large number of foreigners taking up jobs in the country meant that there was a heavy outflow of funds from Malaysia.

"We find that every year, we lose billions of ringgit as foreign workers remit their income to their countries of origin [...] there is an outflow of funds.

"In any country, if their money flows out, we become poorer. If it flows in, we become richer. Therefore, if possible, we don't want our money to flow out.

"If we can use our own workers, then money can be retained to make our country richer," he said.

Mahathir stressed that a decision had yet to be made on such a subsidy as a study was still being conducted to determine its feasibility.

Earlier today, Sin Chew Daily reported that the government was mulling an RM6 billion allocation for a salary subsidy for fresh graduates aged between 20 to 30 years old.

It said the subsidy could amount to between RM700 to RM1,000 per person. - Mkini