Discussion: economics of labour migration
The topline is that 95% of migrant workers are satisfied working in Singapore. What does that really mean? Where are possible problems?
Is the work injury compensation system stacked against workers, especially those who work singly (i.e. not in teams)? How to prove that it happened at work?
A large number of employers in MOM's 2024 survey reported using recruitment channels strongly associated with excessive fees and kickbacks. Time to stop denying how dirty our recruitment landscape is.
Difficult to get workers with the needed skills, employers say. Look more closely, and we also see a huge reluctance to sponsor workers for training, or even to give them time off to do so.
Seven workers recruited by the extended family of a husband-and-wife couple based in Singapore paid $9,000 each to get jobs jere. Big salaries promised, then stopped altogether.
An employer fails to pay salaries in full or on time, ignores the rule that salaries muct be paid through bank, or that payslips must be issued. When challenged by TADM, the boss presents falsified documents.
A family in Burma fears the army will be knocking on their doors soon. Where can they send their sons to be safe? What does it take to get there?
A Bangladeshi welder paid $3,400 to get a shipyard job. No receipts given, he says. Then he had to memorise some lines to say in front of the camera, and to express deep gratitude.
A first-time construction worker from Bangladesh walks us through the months in which he prepared for a working life in Singapore. He spent 15 months in preparation. His working life was 6 months. We haven't even mentioned money!
(Mis)information given to migrant workers before they decide to take up a job, inability to ask the right questions, reliance on agents can lay the ground for serious difficulties after they start work.
