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What do you get from RM60 billion economy stimulus plan?

Last week, Malaysian central goverment unveiled another stimulus plan totalled RM60 billion, to spark the growth on our weaking economy. It’s pretty obvious now that we’re almost there or technically already there… in recession.

Whoever said our economy is in good shape, I don’t know  what in his mind.  Frankly speaking, something is wrong with him (or any hidden agenda). Among the indicator is our export to the US, which drop 27% this month, the worst since 1981. What’s more worrying other than seeing the worse come to worst?

I’m not financial savvy type of person, far from being an economist. Even standard 6 pupil know, 60 billion is a lot of $$, athough only $12 billion funded by goverment and the rest injected by private sector.  Bulk of the money are used to growth the SME by providing loan. And then there are incentive to business to reduce the burden because of drop in sales. And many more.

Personally, do you think you get anything from this package?

I’m working with foreign IT firm, that I doubt receive any incentives  from goverment on the recent stimulus plan.  The industry that I’m in , doesn’t spared from this crisis. Salary cut, no bonus, no increment is pretty common nowadays. At the same time the price of foods, goods and daily needs keep increasing, more than the increment that we have last year. Still grateful of what we have now, but we do expecting from the gov.

 I’m very much aware that, there are a lot more unfortunate peoples who lost their jobs, and part of the focus on stimulus plan is to help this peoples to get back their job. But I don’t think it is selfish to ask, where is our ‘share’?

Private sectors and people from middle class category used to get almost zero benefit from annual budget, stimulus plan and bla bla, when the fact is, we’re living in moderate way too. We still contribute to the country in the form of income tax, for return of almost nothing.

Yeah, I know I’m bragging too much, which is something I seldom do. It won’t get you anywhere, trust me. It just that, there is a hole on the system that need some fix.

Out of billions listed on the stimulus plan,there are 2 benefits that most people can enjoy it.

1. RM5000 rebate for for car-scrapping scheme
This scheme will allow you to enjoy RM50o0 if you trade in your more-than-10-years-old-working-condition car with Malaysian made car. We’re eligible, because of our 13 years old Daihatsu Charade that served us since 6 years ago. It was retired almost 2 years ago, and only serving us during the weekend for buying ‘nasi lemak’ as well as ‘jalan-jalan’ purpose, around our housing area.  Only if we did, we’ll enjoy that benefit, although my wife has sentimetal feeling on this car, as this is the car that brought us together.

2. The RM10,000 tax deduction for interest on housing loans.
We’re fortunate because we just buy a house, hence we’re eligible to enjoy this tax deduction incentive. 

So what else do you found for you? I’m still digging the stimulus plan, hope I can find more..

Admin 17 March 2009 Malaysia Inc , , 1 Comment

November Manufacturing Statistic Showing Little Sign of Malaysia Economy Weakening

The recent news highlighting as many as 45k employees will be temporarily laid off after Chinese New Year is a probably the worst thing to happen after another festive period in Malaysia . It caught everyone in surprise, especially when central government keep repeating their confident that the country can wheather the bad economy.

The electronic industry that hugely depending on the US market is the worst hit sectors, with Penang accounting a huge chunk of it.

November Manufacturing Statistic that had just been released, provide a bigger picture on how the current manufacturing situation is. Taking some important points.

The sales value of the Manufacturing sector in November, 2008 decreased 1.6% (RM734.2 million) year-on-year to record RM45.3 billion. The corresponding growth in October, 2008 was a revised 2.1%. Month-on-month, sales value was also down by RM460 million or 1.0%.

Total employees engaged in the Manufacturing sector in November, 2008 was 1,051,872 persons, a decrease of 53,257 persons or 4.8% compared to November, 2007. Month-on-month, the number of workers employed also decreased by 10,931 persons or 1.0% as compared to 1,062,803 persons employed in October, 2008.

On a positive side, the overall productivity has slightly increased, although no justification provided if it is achived by better process, machine assisted or human factor itself.

Productivity or average sales value per employee in November, 2008 went up by 3.4% year-on-year to register RM43,058.35. The comparative figure for November, 2007 was RM41,647.72. Productivity in November, 2008, also increase by 0.02 % as compared to the preceding month.

Full statistic can be obtained here

graph1 450x292 November Manufacturing Statistic Showing Little Sign of Malaysia Economy Weakening

graph2 450x305 November Manufacturing Statistic Showing Little Sign of Malaysia Economy Weakening

Admin 21 January 2009 Promotion , , , , , , 2 Comments

The (not so true) Penang manufacturing plants crisis

amd The (not so true) Penang manufacturing plants crisis

Lately, the retrenchment, VSS, and laid off has gotten more highlight online and offline. Although certain parties deny that economy is in crisis, but the fact that it has started impacting the manufacturing sectors earlier than expected is the sign that it will later impact downstream & upstream industries dependent on it.

Malaysia particularly Penang, where most of manufacturing facilities are residing have started to feel the pain. There are numerous emails saying this and that companies are going to close, VSS or take a long shut down during incoming holiday. Although there are indeed companies which are affected, but some appears to be inaccurate.

For instance, on one email circulated around (copy here) where it states that AMD Penang is going to offer VSS to 500 employees appears to be untrue. The truth is that, this is the number for worldwide retrenchment, as denied by its HR.

But if you do quick googling on this matter, a lot of blogs & forums have posted this news without doing any early fact finding. If you pay a little more attention to the end of first search result page (SERP), you’ll figure out the correct news. But the problem is most of us doesn’t pay attention to that and how many of us actually do some ‘googling’ or researhing before making any posts??

Yeah, I know that you’re not a journalist, but at least be little bit more responsible of what you’re writing.

Imagine if this post read by anyone who has son/daughter/husband/wife/relative working in AMD. What will they feel? And what will happen if they happen to have stroke or heart attack???

It is nature that such news gaining a lot of attention, and spreading like fire. Everyone wants a piece of traffics from such ‘breaking’ news right?? Everyone wants to be the first to report it without thinking of the consequences.

Obviously this is not the first case and not that serious. If you have a good memory, few months back there was a similar issue where a journalist from 1 local online news portal resigned after admitting posting a fake news that he received from unconfirmed resource.

But the damage has been done. It has been read by thousands of people who will misinterpret it, although he appologized about it later on (at least he does so once he’s aware of it). So the responsibility to post only accurate news not only at the hand premier online news portal or mainstream media (which we see sometimes lacking of it), but it has to start also from you and me as well.

Admin 18 December 2008 Jobs & Career , , , , , , No Comments

Is there any job layoff in malaysia?

72451236 5ee59608f4 m Is there any job layoff in malaysia?Lay off and VSS are among the last few words that most employees would like to hear off, other than ‘you’re fired!!’. But this is the reality for those working in private sector must face today. Financial lost, missing profit target, merge and acquisition(M&A) are among good ‘excuses’ for that. And now, mother of all crisis, recession, has turned the situation even worse.

In Cyberjaya and Penang, the 2 IT and electronic hot spots in Malaysia, business seems booming as usual. There is almost no news about lay offs on mainstream newspapers. In fact, job recruitment continues as like nothing happened. The job advertisement can be found in online or offline mediums or even word-of-mouth.

But in reality, only small number of people are aware about what is happening. In the last few days also, I’ve received few emails regarding the possible layoffs, or operation shut down/time off on numbers of manufacturing companies in Penang plus few outsourcing companies in Cyberjaya. To avoid being seen as speculative, I won’t post it here  until I’m pretty much sure about the truth of this email.

If there is a person who should worry about it, one of them should be me. And that’s why I’m called upon to write this. I’ve been working in MNC for a few years in Penang & Cyberjaya. In that short period of time, I’ve seen VSS once, and another round off VSS recently, even though Asia Pacific region is excluded this time. Like other person who is in this position, it will put you in difficult situation to remain here, when the job safety can hardly be felt.

Even though the situation as a whole in Malaysia might not be as bad as other regions especially in the US, but that doesn’t mean our region is safe. Judging on the report layoff tracker from the TechCrunch and Cnet, the number is no longer to be taken for granted.

So are we free from this crisis? This article might say so. But if you go through the list of companies, there are a few common names which are operating in Malaysia. So it is not possible that part of the lay off workers will come from us.

While the whole picture looks darker ahead, there is still a positive aspect. The price of crude oil has consistently dropped to below $60 per-barrel recently. It was a relief for most motorists, but has very little impact on other commodity, food or electronic price.

If you’re worried about the safety of your job, why don’t spend your time reading this guide. It’ll educate you on your rights as employee, what you deserve to, including compensation package.

Admin 14 November 2008 Malaysia Inc , , , , 12 Comments
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