A deputy minority leader on Sunday urged the country’s regional wage boards (RWBs) to act immediately in providing private-sector workers immediate relief from the rising cost of basic goods and services.
“Measured minimum-wage increases are now more than justified, so we are counting on the boards to do their job,” Makati City Rep. Luis N. Campos Jr. said in a statement.
Citing the Department of Labor and Employment, Campos said there are some 4.1 million minimum-wage earners in the private sector.
Campos added that despite the increasing prices of commodities, only few RWBs have so far ordered minimum pay increases.
These wage boards have implemented the following minimum wage rates: Ilocos region (P265 to P310), Calabarzon or Region 4A (P317 to P400) and Soccsksargen or Region 12 (P311).
Also, the Western Visayas (Region 6) board sets minimum wages at P295 to P365, while Eastern Visayas (Region 8) board implemented P305 minimum wage and Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao at P280, with several orders still pending publication and effectivity.
The Trade Union Congress of the Philippines has already filed a wage petition for a P320 across-the-board pay hike in the National Capital Region.
Moreover, the lawmaker said the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) itself expects consumer price increases to gather steam in the current quarter.
“The BSP has basically implied that the 5.2-percent inflation rate in June—already the highest in more than five years—is bound to worsen before it eases,” Campos added.
Again citing the BSP, he said inflation “peak will probably occur sometime in the third quarter,” before slowing down to between 2 percent to 4 percent in 2019.
Meanwhile, Campos said public-sector workers are in a better position to cope with higher inflation.
“Government employees received the third installment of their salary increases in January this year, and are expected to receive the fourth and last portion in January 2019,” he said.
Campos was referring to the four-year phased implementation beginning 2016 of the compensation adjustment for government personnel under Executive Order 201 of 2016.