Thursday, April 24, 2008 Dad: Wage hike equals productivity By Gil Alfredo B. Severino
PROVINCIAL Board Member Patrick Lacson, chairman committee on trade, commerce and industry is sympathetic to the clamor of minimum wage earners but reminded them of productivity and their readiness to accept "trade offs."
Lacson said in several "wage and productivity" board consultations he had attended, "it is quite apparent that only wages are discussed and everyone forgets about productivity."
Lacson admitted, though, that while wages are easy to compute, "productivity is quite a variable and difficult to quantify."
"I believe this is where labor and management should submit various positions papers. This is a personal experience but the Department of Labor and Employment seems to be on the 'wage side' only." Lacson also said.
"It is also true that an increased wage could be an incentive to increased productivity. Generally, however, labor, management and government should have a very clear stand as far as productivity standard is concerned," he added.
Lacson said "a legal or a legislated approach to wage hike could be anti-labor if the productivity aspect of a business is not addressed. What if a business losses because of low productivity?"
Meantime, Lacson said businesses also sacrifice to comply with wage increases. "From overtimes to layoffs, these are cost trade-offs which labor must understand should one factor of production value-added is increased without considering the other factors."
"Increasing wage should be equal to increasing land, capital and fringe benefits. If a business cannot afford this, a tradeoff must be made or the worst might happened - layoff," he added.
