The Solution on the Unemployment Problem of the Country by Evelyn C. Agumbay (April, 2004)

The Filipinos are healthy. The Philippines is unhealthy. We have a strong mass of working men, but there is no job to do. Worse of all, this picture of unemployment is framed with overpopulation that brought a yearly increase of unemployment percentage.

The unemployment and underemployment rate at 11.4% and 17% respectively, remained unchanged. Based on the 2003 employment situation released by the Bureau of Labor and Employment Statistics (BLES) early this year, graduating students do have much to worry about. The work force, which is composed of person fifteen years old above, grew by 2.9 %. The 2003 figure stands at 51.791 million more than the 2002 figure, which stands at 50.344 million. If your cup is half full, the figures is encouraging after all, numbers did not increase despite the growth of the population. If your cup is half-empty, it means that 11.4 % of the graduating students are likely to find employment soon. May be some will be employed but not in the jobs they are trained for while five out of seven of Filipinos work abroad.

Because opportunities in the countryside have disappeared, people migrated to the urban centers like Manila in the hope to find milk and honey. But right in the heart of Manila they found nothing but an income insufficient enough to pay the bed spacer. Living in a hand to mouth sustenance in the cities while a vast tracks of land in the province are left idle.

To solve unemployment problem means improve the rural life. Upgrade the agricultural practices, improve agricultural industry and improve farming in such a way that the long lines of job seekers in Manila shall be shortened.

Another scenario that hampers employment situation is the six-month contract policy. This is a blatant one-sided system. Workers are employed for six months then jobless for the rest of the months in the year. We can not question the integrity of the Filipino workers. We have a strong and competent labor-force. Only some of our capitalists are abusive. They don’t look at the humanitarian situation. They think of profit and nothing else. This is a fact that that rendered savagery to the Filipino workers.

One more evil in the employment sector today is agency in a guise of helping anyone land a job. But in reality this is another racket that put the workers in jeopardy. These agencies collect money from their client of which the worker they have helped finding a job has to do the back breaking job without collecting a cent at the end of the month.

Solving unemployment means solve first the mal-practices in the employment situations. Formulate law that disallows the creation of agencies that collect almost half of the worker’s pay.

Finally, we can solve the problem of unemployment if more jobs are available in the market. Open up more industries particularly agriculture. These are some ways of solving unemployment problem. But all this will remain on paper if we have no ears to cry of our people. Those in power must be sensitive enough to the plight of the potential Filipino workers who unfortunately because of unavailability of job live in gutters or hovel. I have therefore the right to say that Filipinos are healthy, but the Philippines is unhealthy.