Weigh wage hike carefully
The Prayut Chan-o-cha government, which was officially sworn in this week, will have to weigh carefully the demand by labour leaders for the daily minimum wage to be raised to 400 baht.
The 400-baht hike was one of the poll campaign promises made by the Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP) ahead of the March 24 general election in a bid to woo voters. Labour bosses have come out to remind the PPRP, as the core coalition party, to honour its pledge or face a legal challenge. Given this tough stance, other sections of society are holding their breath as they fear a slew of adverse impacts from the increase, including higher living costs while a rise in goods prices would inevitably hurt the country’s competitiveness.
