Incentive may dissuade graduates from seeking job – LDP
KOTA KINABALU: The wage incentive of RM500 per month for graduates who secure a job after being unemployed for more than a year under the Graduate@ Work programme in Budget 2020 may dissuade graduates from seeking employment immediately after completing their studies.
Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) New Generation Movement leader Eric Lau said the wage incentive would not be able to address the high unemployment rate.
“In fact, the Graduate@Work programme may backfire as graduates may rather go jobless for a year in order to be eligible for the wage incentive.”
He said the government should focus on increasing students' competitiveness and productivity, rather than using cash incentives to ‘encourage' the graduates.
Lau said there were many factors contributing to unemployment, such as mismatch of the graduates' skill sets against industry demands, lack of competitiveness and demand for overly high salaries.
In addition, he pointed out that the Graduate@Work programme was also unfair to job-seeking fresh graduates as employers might opt to hire graduates who had been unemployed for more than a year in order to receive the incentive up to RM300 per month for each new hire for two years.
He suggested expanding the criteria for the hiring incentive for employers to include fresh graduates as well.
He added that the incentive should be given for employers who hired Malaysians to retain local talent in the country.
Nevertheless, Lau also urged graduates and students to equip themselves with the relevant skill sets before they stepped into society.
“A lot of fresh graduates would rather stay unemployed than to work for a lower salary.
“This mindset should be taken into account by the government in search for a win-win solution that meet both the needs of employers and employees in an effort to reduce the unemployment rate in Malaysia.”
Lau also hoped that students would consider carefully the job prospects of the courses they pursued at higher learning institutions to avoid the possibility of unemployment in the future.