KUALA LUMPUR – The termination of the Wage Subsidy Programme (PSU) will not contribute to increase in lay-offs or a rise in the unemployment rate, said Social Security Organisation (Socso) chief executive Datuk Seri Mohammed Azman Aziz Mohammed.
He said this was based on the results of a survey by the EIS-UPMCS Centre for Future Labour Market (EU-ERA) involving 469 companies receiving the PSU.
The survey found that only 15% of respondents planned to reduce the number of their employees, while 29% plan to increase their manpower and over half or 56% intend to retain their existing workers.
"The results of this survey also support the government’s targeted PSU for this year as contained in Budget 2021," he said in a statement today.
The PSU, designed by the government as direct financial assistance to companies to maintain employment during the Covid-19 pandemic, was launched on April 1, last year, initially to cover financial assistance for six months and later another three months under PSU 2.0.
As of December 31, more than 3.7 million employees and 428,516 employers have benefited from both programmes.
The termination of the PSU has led to public debate over its impact on employment and, subsequently, its implications on the country's unemployment rate.
Azman said the online survey was aimed at assessing the impact of the PSU termination on employment from October 30 to November 22 last year, with the results of the survey detailed in "The Day After Tomorrow Report: Estimating the Impacts of Ending Temporary Wage Subsidy Programme" report.
However, he said the findings of the survey did not take into account the economic impact due to the implementation of the conditional movement control order (CMCO) in the Klang Valley that began on October 14 last year and the implementation of the MCO 2.0 on January 13.
He added that the CMCO and MCO 2.0 are expected to have a moderate impact on economic recovery, which could then potentially affect employment.
EU-ERA is a collaborative research centre between SIP Socso and Universiti Putra Malaysia Consultancy & Services. – Bernama, February 6, 2021
