Hundreds dismissed due to wage hike | Bangkok Post: tech

Since the government's blanket enforcement of the 300-baht daily minimum wage took effect nationwide on Jan 1, 275 workers had been sacked in the first four days of the year, Labour Minister Padermchai Sasomsap said on Tuesday.

Photo by Somchai Poomlard

According to the Department of Labour Protection and Welfare,  four factories had been hard hit by the government's wage policy and had dismissed a total of 275 workers between Jan 1 and 4.

"Two more factories will likely sack another 480 workers soon and there are five other factories that appear to have liquidity  problems and the contracts of 999 workers there will expire," Mr Padermchai said.

Finance permanent secretary Areepong Bhucha-oom confirmed  the Ministry of Finance will propose five measures to ease the impact of the new 300 baht daily minimum wage on small- and medium-sized businesses to the cabinet meeting today.

Mr Padermchai said last week the first proposal was to reduce official fees collected from small- and medium-sized hotels by 50% for three years. The fee currently stands at 80 baht per occupied room.

The second involves organising workshops to develop the skills of workers in educational institutions and companies.

The other proposals include increasing the payment for organising government-sponsored seminars, so that private firms involved would get more revenue, organising events to sell consumer products at cheap prices, and tax reductions for SMEs, down from 3% to 2%.

Mr Areepong said on Monday that the Finance Ministry will ask the cabinet to consider raising the income tax exemption limit from 150,000 baht to 300,000 baht for small- and medium-enterprises with annual revenue below 50 million baht.

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