Association identifies economy as central public concern

With the economy at the center of public discussion, a survey has discovered that residents want adjustments to the cash handout policy.

The Choi In Tong Sam Association, with three lawmakers in its leadership, held a press conference yesterday morning to announce the result of a survey conducted between mid-October and mid-November.

The survey was done to gather public opinion on the Policy Address that will be announced today.

The group managed to distil 1,826 valid online questionnaire responses from a total of more than 5,000. Questionnaires were distributed online mainly on the group’s WeChat account, and also to groups, websites and Facebook pages of the group and to the Macao Federation of Trade Unions (FAOM), a traditional association to which the group is closely affiliated.

The group revealed that 42.7% of valid responses identified economic and subsidization measures as their principal concern. Following this are price controls (37.2%), economic development (33.8%) and housing policies (32.3%).

Executive director Lam Lon Wai of the group revealed that most respondents were concerned with the lack of “synergy” for an economic revival, especially underscored by the constantly rising unemployment rate.

According to Lam, respondents showed concerns over outstanding salary payments, compensations for official work suspensions and worries about potential lay-offs by casino operators. Many fear that after the re-issuing of licenses, casino operators will start dismissing workers in order to lower costs, Lam pointed out. Moreover, respondents were also concerned with the numbers of non-resident workers and youth employment.

Analyzing the situation, the group saw that Macau would need to find new leverage points to develop new trades to support economic progress and employment growth.

On regional integration, the survey included questions on Hengqin and Guangdong. On this issue, the group calls for the government to help young people find jobs in Hengqin “so as to create space for the employment of young people,” Lam said.

In addition, Lam admitted that Macau residents still face challenges relocating to Hengqin when it comes to salary levels, work culture and lifestyle. He also wants more policies to help people from Macau integrate into Hengqin.

Two topics related to economic problems are subsidies and the high prices of essential goods. On this topic, lawmaker and deputy executive director of the group Ella Lei said that despite the public welcoming the retention of the cash handout scheme in the coming year, the scheme should be adjusted to use public funds more wisely.

Lei pointed out that many former residents who left Macau long ago are still receiving the cash distributed by the government. It is highly unlikely that such people will use the money in Macau. As such, Lei recommends the government adopt the eligibility criteria used in the Central Provident Fund to require cash handout recipients to remain in Macau for at least 183 days per year to qualify.

Nonetheless, Lei added that many people who live in the mainland but work in Macau, as well as those studying outside of the city fear that they will be excluded from the scheme. Lei suggests that provided such people are able to prove a connection with Macau, this should be sufficient to qualify them, even if they do not meet the daily retention threshold.

Another problem is that local commodity prices, especially fuel, are constantly on the rise. Lei especially mentioned that gasoline prices have not reflected the reality or projection of the global price levels of the commodity. She said that the prices often went up but seldom down, regardless of the fluctuations of global oil prices.

Lawmaker Leong Sun Iok, also deputy executive director of the group, reported that most respondents were concerned with economic and sandwich-class housing schemes. The group elaborated that although the government wanted to construct a housing “ladder”, by proposing the exclusion of economic housing unit owners from buying sandwich-class housing, the group cannot see vertical mobility in the so-called “ladder”.

Therefore, Leong said that the government should consider allowing economic housing owners – past or present – to enjoy a one-off chance of purchasing a sandwich-class housing unit, so as to signal its commitment to building a housing ladder.

Both Lei and Leong recommends more targeted support for sandwich-class income groups, those who have spouses, children, parents, deducted salaries due to work suspensions and mortgaged homes of which the debt repayments are ongoing based on partial salaries.

The last question of the survey invited open answers to free topics and 361 respondents gave feedback, the group added.