<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width=452 border=0><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top width=452 colSpan=2>Published January 10, 2009
</TD></TR><TR><TD vAlign=top width=452 colSpan=2>Big mistake to axe older workers: minister
By CHUANG PECK MING
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IT is tempting for governments in this economic climate of massive job losses to push for early retirement to make the employment numbers look good. But that would be a big mistake, according to Lim Boon Heng, Minister in the Prime Minister's Office.
And he warned bosses yesterday not to chop older workers when they have to retrench to save costs, simply because these workers are old.
'Employers should not use age as a factor should they need to reduce headcount to save on wage costs,' Mr Lim said at the closing of a two-day conference called 'Reinventing Retirement Asia'.
'We need to send the message out to employers that we should be age blind in this matter,' the former secretary-general of the National Trades Union Congress told reporters after the conference, organised by AARP and the Council for Third Age.
When unemployment shot up in past economic downturns, one answer to the problem was to ask older workers to take an early retirement and give their jobs to younger ones, Mr Lim noted.
'Today, we know that people do have to work longer because they need the money - and so age should not be used as a factor for trimming of wage costs,' he said. 'It should be based on productivity factors.'
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</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>According to him, European governments made the 'policy error' of encouraging early retirement in the 1980s. 'Now (they) find it more difficult to raise the employment rate of seniors when it is apparent that people need to work longer,' Mr Lim said.
Putting up laws to protect older workers from the discrimination of bosses will not solve the problem.
'The solution is not in the magic bullet of legislation,' he said. 'It is understanding what actually works at the workplace and what makes a company retain one employee versus another. If we understand that, we probably have the right solution.'
Mr Lim is not sure if older workers were disproportionately affected in recent layoffs in Singapore. But he would not be surprised that a higher percentage of older workers were axed because many were still low skilled.
'If the skills level is low and therefore productivity is low, then the company may be less competitive with respect to the product line which it is currently doing,' he said. 'And if it can't sell because it is not competitive, then when it retrenches, the older ones will be affected.'
Older workers in this circumstance would lose their jobs not because of age discrimination, but because of their low skills.
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</TD></TR><TR><TD vAlign=top width=452 colSpan=2>Big mistake to axe older workers: minister
By CHUANG PECK MING
<TABLE class=storyLinks cellSpacing=4 cellPadding=1 width=136 align=right border=0><TBODY><TR class=font10><TD align=right width=20>
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</TD><TD>Feedback</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>IT is tempting for governments in this economic climate of massive job losses to push for early retirement to make the employment numbers look good. But that would be a big mistake, according to Lim Boon Heng, Minister in the Prime Minister's Office.
And he warned bosses yesterday not to chop older workers when they have to retrench to save costs, simply because these workers are old.
'Employers should not use age as a factor should they need to reduce headcount to save on wage costs,' Mr Lim said at the closing of a two-day conference called 'Reinventing Retirement Asia'.
'We need to send the message out to employers that we should be age blind in this matter,' the former secretary-general of the National Trades Union Congress told reporters after the conference, organised by AARP and the Council for Third Age.
When unemployment shot up in past economic downturns, one answer to the problem was to ask older workers to take an early retirement and give their jobs to younger ones, Mr Lim noted.
'Today, we know that people do have to work longer because they need the money - and so age should not be used as a factor for trimming of wage costs,' he said. 'It should be based on productivity factors.'
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Putting up laws to protect older workers from the discrimination of bosses will not solve the problem.
'The solution is not in the magic bullet of legislation,' he said. 'It is understanding what actually works at the workplace and what makes a company retain one employee versus another. If we understand that, we probably have the right solution.'
Mr Lim is not sure if older workers were disproportionately affected in recent layoffs in Singapore. But he would not be surprised that a higher percentage of older workers were axed because many were still low skilled.
'If the skills level is low and therefore productivity is low, then the company may be less competitive with respect to the product line which it is currently doing,' he said. 'And if it can't sell because it is not competitive, then when it retrenches, the older ones will be affected.'
Older workers in this circumstance would lose their jobs not because of age discrimination, but because of their low skills.
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