Femme Power

Posts Tagged ‘Social Issues’

I just finished watching the late night news.   Somehow, it alarmed me to see signs of  what everyone has been dreading to happen for the past months.   The global economic turmoil has started creeping into the country.

I don’t wanna say it’s a bleak economy right in front of us because it terrifies me.   But more and more people everyday are being displaced from jobs here and abroad.

Here in the Philippines alone,  Filipino workers who lost their jobs have already reached 15,000.   Intel, for one,  is reported to close down their assembly test facility in Cavite City due to the decline of market demands in electronics.

Though the government is assuring that there are enough jobs that are up and coming, one can’t help but wonder where these jobs are.

And granting these jobs are available right in front of our faces, would our skills match with the requirements of the jobs?   Employers especially in the BPO and Call Center industries have long revealed that they have many positions left unfilled for so long due to jobs-skills mismatch.

It would be tremendous if the government would be MORE aggressive in identifying the job demands here and abroad and be MORE aggressive in information dissemination - like saturating the Barangay levels.   Given this, it would help a lot if MORE people will and can take advantage of TESDA’s programs that will equip them with the skills to match the hottest jobs available.

It would also be a big boost if entrepreneurship among Filipinos is strongly encouraged and supported by the government, banking and business sectors.

Malacañang has repeatedly announced that the Philippine economy is robust and can withstand the ill effects of the global financial crisis.

But should we choose to wait and see?

To me, this is not a sole responsibility of the government.   As JFK once said, “Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.”

What can we do?

In the midst of a global financial crisis, one can never be so sure what lies ahead.    While jobs and other income sources around the world may be available to many of us now, it is best to arm ourselves with savings that would keep us afloat when we retire.

But in the spate of rising costs of living anywhere in the world, setting aside money for retirement is getting tougher than ever.

Addressing this concern, Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the US House of Representatives recently unveiled a comprehensive plan for retirement security that will empower America’s middle class families to have guaranteed savings after long years of toil.

Pelosi, the first woman in American history to become a Democratic Leader in the House of representatives, revealed Amerisave will expand and improve existing retirement accounts, ensure pension fairness and build retirement security for nearly 100 million Americans.   It will expand opportunities to save by establishing tax credits to employers who offer such a savings plan so small businesses will have resources to set up their employees’ retirement accounts.   It also encourages employers to automatically enroll their employees to the plan.

Furthermore, important reforms will be made to protect individuals from unfair dumping of pension plans due to bankruptcy.

The road ahead is quite uphill not only for the Americans but for everyone around us.   We all need guaranteed retirement savings that are secure enough not to go up in smoke by the time we need them.

As important as the will to save today is a plan for a retirement security that’s as smart, well-meaning and safe as possible.

A colored photo in the Philippine Daily Inquirer last Sept 14 caught my attention. Not only that, it pierced my heart. It was a picture of a mother and her child literally swimming through neck-deep garbage on Manila Bay. Reason? They were scouring for recyclables to sell.

The photo captured the mom passing on to her child (who, by the way, looked not over 7 years old) a plastic yellow scoop typically used in infant formula milk preparations. The child, while flinging one arm over their “salbabida,” (rubber tube lifesaver) was holding a clear plastic bag where they collected their precious finds. His other arm was for reaching what her mother would hand over to him. A plastic scoop.

For the unfathomable dangers of drowning and the gravity of exposure to germs and the diseases that come with them, braving to slog through the sea of garbage is shocking.

What could make anyone do that? Hunger. Poverty.

Obviously, they had very little options – either swim through the garbage-filled seawater and risk drowning and getting sick or, the harder part, die from hunger.

I don’t know how to end this blog but there’s one thing I’m sure of – with all the squabbling and mud slinging in our Executive and Legislative departments, what our country truly needs are open eyes and warm hearts and our mouths full of trash shut.

(Kudos to Ryan Lim of PDI. Your photo speaks a thousand words.)