Decent Employment in the Philippines

“Statistics show that in terms of providing decent employment for our people, we have not improved in the past five years. Unemployment remains at an average of about 11 percent “Benigno Aquino said to President Arroyo, May 5, 2007.” 11.4% in 2002, 11.3% in 2003, 11.8% in 2004, 11.5% in 2005 and 7.9% in 2006. The 2006 drop rate is due to the change in the definition of unemployment of NSCB Resolution No. 15, Series of 2004, issued on 20 October 2004 which describes he unemployed as those who are 15 years older that has no work, seeking for work and those who are available for work. Philippines is ranked as the highest among the South East Asian countries as to the rate of unemployment. In addition, Aquino again said that despite of the employment projects of the Arroyo government; it still did not made the rate of unemployment in the country improve. Arroyo also reiterated that if the Philippines’ unemployment issue is improving, then why do the Filipinos suffer from being apart from their families here in our country?

Because of cultural integration and in a structural-functional perspective in which a change in one part affects the whole, unemployment has a great effect in the Philippines. The lesser the job opportunities are, the lesser the employed Filipinos will be. The greater the unemployment is, the poorer the families get. And when poverty takes place, the greater the education of their children will be affected. The more uneducated Filipinos get, the lesser the quality of service they can offer and the lesser the investors will be attracted to invest in our country. The lesser investors and other economic transactions are, the lower the Philippine economy will be wherein it is now being experienced for over a long period of time. If an economy is low, it is more likely that there are other problems that we may relate to unemployment.

One problem is poverty. And this is when cultural variations take place wherein cultures differ in the varieties of solutions that people do to solve their problems- in this case, it is the unemployment. People will engage in to different solutions that violate the law of their society such as robbery, theft and other related activities. Another case is when men and women engage in prostitution for the sake of having money to provide the needs of their family. Also, in rural areas, the children’s parents would prefer to not let them study and instead, work for the family. This in effect will make the children uneducated and will have less chances of getting a job in their future. The family will be deprives with a good nutrition, education, health and stable housing. There is also a psychological effect to the unemployed.

Educational attainment and school image are also a factor when it comes to employment. Those who graduated from a prestigious or well known school will possibly have a better job opportunity than those who came to an ordinary school. That is why when a person studies at a prestigious school, they become ethnocentric to the fact that they became discriminative. An opposite effect comes to those students who graduated in a “not so popular schools” in which they became xenocentric that results to the lack of confidence and drive to pursue their plans. Educational attainment also ranks the person when it comes to job vacancies. If s/he is only a highschool or elementary graduate, they are more likely to be placed in a lower type of job. Social stratification takes place because most companies prefer highly educated employees than those who just finished elementary and highschool. Socio-economic status differentiates the highly educated to those who are not.

In a country like ours, unemployment is strongly inevitable. The society experiences a negative domino effect due to the issue of unemployment. If there is unemployment, there is poverty, health problems and criminal acts etc… It is one of the main roots of the low economic profile of the Philippines. Because as one part changes… the others will follow..

Source:

https://www.rappler.com/nation/136750-filipinos-jobs-remain-poor-world-bank