Social security fund should be repaid to the workers: Expert

YOGYAKARTA (JP): The Rp 6 trillion (about US$600 million) state social security fund should be repaid to the workers who contributed to it to help alleviate their hardship in this time of crisis, an expert has proposed.

Tadjuddin Noer Effendi, an advisor to the minister of manpower, said Wednesday that as millions of workers had already lost and more would lose their jobs, the cash would mean a lot to them.

The labor-intensive programs that the government has initiated benefit mostly blue color workers; middle and upper level employees who lose their jobs find it more difficult to obtain new employment, he said.

Tadjuddin, who is a senior researcher at Gadjah Mada University's Population Studies Center, said the rightful owners of the fund that the government manages as working capital were those who contributed to it.

"Repaying the money would be better than using it to pay House of Representatives members deliberating labor laws (as recently happened)," he said.

Tadjuddin hailed the labor-intensive schemes the government has sponsored to alleviate poverty in the wake of the prolonged economic crisis.

Such projects, he said, were necessary to help ease social tension caused by soaring prices and mounting unemployment.

"It is a good short-term solution for blue-collar workers, such as construction laborers. The projects will be needed until economic growth reaches about 5 percent."

Tadjuddin estimated the number of unemployed at more than 10 million. (44)