Dba 8105 Public Policy Assessment Answer

On January 2013, the Malaysia government implemented a minimum wage policy of RM900 and RM800 per month for Peninsular and East Malaysia respectively and thereby, joining the worlds more than 150 countries with minimum wage. The minimum wage legislation is formed to prevent the employers exploit the workers, to promote a fair distribution wage structure and finally to give a minimum satisfactory standard of living for low wage workers. Malaysia has an aspiration to be higher income and high productivity economy country by 2050 and the implementation of minimum wage is expected to play a major role in achieving this goal. Minimum wage policy is expected to give encouragement to firms to carry out productivity enhancing measures such as investing in automation and latest technologies, reducing the dependency of firms on the cheap (low cost) foreign labour. Thus, the minimum wage is one of the important catalysts in transforming Malaysia into a high productivity country. However, there are always different views on the minimum wage. For instance, theoretically, the classical economic theories predict that dead weight losses will occur due to the implementation of minimum wage. Empirically, various studies have found the negative impacts of minimum wage.

 

You are required to provide a critical review of literature on the impacts of implementation of minimum wage in Malaysia (OR any country of your choice), and from a perspective of a

manager, you are required to suggest the government on the suitable policies remedies/enhancements/etc on the minimum wage implementation in Malaysia.