NEWS RELEASE

September 5, 2006

Tech-voc grads end up in low-paying, highly-exploitative jobs

Technical vocational courses supply the pool of skilled reserve labor that services multinational firms which transferred the labor-intensive part of their production processes to low-wage countries like the Philippines according to the militant labor center Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU).

"They get jobs as contractuals in assembly lines of automotive, electronics, and other foreign-owned manufacturing firms or in export-oriented businesses owned by the local elite classes. They are being made to serve the interest of multinational firms in search of cheap skilled labor but are not really helpful in industrializing the country. This is what they are really saying when boasting of tech-voc courses as the way to globalization," said KMU Secretary General Joel Maglunsod.

Maglunsod said that 'mismatch' in jobs and education is just a symptom of the real problem of job generation, "There is a great mismatch because the local economy, continuously plundered by the profiteering of multinational firms and depleted by the rapacious consumption of the local elite classes, remains backward."

There is a continuous employment contraction in the industrial sector. It contracted by 15.72% in 2000 and 14.86% in 2005." "The government continuously boasts that there are vacant jobs in industry but hides the fact that there is unremitting retrenchment of regular workers in companies like the PLDT, San Miguel Corp., and others pursuing labor contractualization to reduce wage cost," said Maglunsod.

Moreover, the KMU said, most Filipino students are forced to take tech-voc courses because the domestic educational system is highly-commercialized.

"Ang kailangan ng bansang ito ay hindi turuan lamang sa pagbubutinting at mag-asembol ang mga Pinoy kundi ang komprehensibo at mahusay na edukasyon hinggil sa science, research, engineering, atbp. na siyang magsusulong ng industriyasasyon. Hanggang prayoridad ng gobyerno ang labor export policy (LEP) at mga trabaho tulad ng call center operators, assembly line workers at iba pa, mananatiling atrasado ang ating ekonomiya at higit na malulublob sa pagiging palaasa sa dayuhang pumumuhunan na dumarambong sa yamang pinagpawisan ng mamamayan ," ended Maglunsod.