BACOLOD City — As the world marks the International Labor Day today, workers in the Philippines remain exploited, according to a workers’ group.
Every May 1, workers are “subjected to lip service, platitudes and flattery by politicians and government apologists,” the General Alliance of Workers Assembly (GAWA) said in a Labor Day Manifesto.
“Majority of our poor workers remain the same — suffering under deplorable and worsening economic conditions,” it said.
GAWA said the more workers work, the poorer they get.
Unscrupulous employers exploit their workers by offering below-minimum wages, which cannot provide a worker’s family decent meals, it said.
GAWA also said the workers’ wages and benefits were not keeping up with the increase in the prices of goods and services.
Their purchasing power “[goes] down [as] prices keep on going up,” it said. “The workers have not gotten back the real value of their wages through years of minimum wage adjustment.”
It also lamented that “the working class today [is] underemployed, underpaid, under-protected and underfed.”
“The fundamental social cause of excesses, which violates the rules of social life, is the exploitation of the poor toiling masses,” said GAWA./PN
