But let’s concentrate on the second part of the term: “evil”.
What justifies taking a year’s pay from someone?
Some are better than others, for sure, but are they all taking advantage of someone else’s work to make a profit? I think the answer must be yes. Are they all getting a disproportionate sum? It’s probably fair to say yes to that as well, all though the degree to which it is true is likely different between brokerages.
Why not a government agency? There needs to be system to match employers and employees, but there doesn’t have to be fat cat at the top reaping all the benefits for doing little more than connecting two parties.
I think a government service to match both groups would be welcome. The government would fund the program through the taxes it receives. But then that money would go back into the Phillipines to help the public rather than to the pockets of a handful of capitalists. (at least theoretically)
A middle man is necessary, but he doesn’t necessarily have to be evil.
That is a fair argument, but that doesn’t justify the actions of employment agencies. Nothing justifies taking the earnings of another person to benefit yourself without giving something of equal value to that person in return. Right now the imbalance between what the agencies take and what the workers get out of the relationship is simply wrong.
But let’s concentrate on the second part of the term: “evil”.
What justifies taking a year’s pay from someone?[/quote]
I imagine the only justification is the willingness of one party to give one year’s pay - in exchange for the what they will earn for the other 5 years. Altogether, what they could earn in these 6 years in Taiwan would likely be far far more than what they would earn in 6 years at home.
Why not a government agency? There needs to be system to match employers and employees, but there doesn’t have to be fat cat at the top reaping all the benefits for doing little more than connecting two parties.
I think a government service to match both groups would be welcome. The government would fund the program through the taxes it receives. But then that money would go back into the Philippines to help the public rather than to the pockets of a handful of capitalists. (at least theoretically)
A middle man is necessary, but he doesn’t necessarily have to be evil.[/quote]
But there is a government agency! It’s called OWWA - Overseas Workers Welfare Administration - www.owwa.gov.ph (site is down at the moment)
So why is there still a problem? It’s Philippine government that’s why - a shining example of how not to run your country, unless you want to run it to the ground, that is
OWWA grievances - which range from being simply useless to a waste of time and taxes - run long, but can be expected from a banana republic - which spends more money on its Army than its Navy, an indicator that the government is more afraid of internal strife than in protecting its borders from JI - post-9/11 notwithstanding.
OWWA can be improved, and hopefully it will in our lifetimes, given that it’s responsibility covers a sector of the Philippine economy that accounts for 10 to 15% of that country’s output.
Back to topic - what is the result of government being involved? Middlemen and fixers who fill the gaps and grease the system. I don’t believe this ‘evil’ sprang from no where. They exist because there is a need. A real need. And filling that need isn’t evil, is it? It’s a tragedy that some cheat their workers. But let’s not defend the existence of brokers - I asked that we propose something better. And that’s when the silence begins :s
[quote=“puiwaihin”]
That is a fair argument, but that doesn’t justify the actions of employment agencies. Nothing justifies taking the earnings of another person to benefit yourself without giving something of equal value to that person in return. Right now the imbalance between what the agencies take and what the workers get out of the relationship is simply wrong.[/quote]
I certainly wouldn’t argue for agencies that cheat. But is this only what we are talking about here?
Incidentally, there is a separate, but related fact about bad brokers… bad workers. Not all workers are saints.
Without a doubt, the sacrifice all workers undertake is genuine and admirable. I live and work in Taiwan not because there are no worthwhile jobs for me back home, but because I happen to like living and working here. This isn’t the case for the Filipina household help of my neighbor downstairs from my apartment, who is a sweet and kind person and can’t be older than 35, and has a daughter who is about to start college in the Philippines whose tuition she is worried about covering.
But there are those here on a contract who inexplicably leave employers who are decent, generous and upright. These runaways become the target and cause of draconian rules or attitudes about migrant workers.
They set the precedent, that leads to tougher rules, that leads to harder placements, that leads to brokerage, that leads to shortcuts, that leads to abuse.
In short, everyone has a stake in this, and everyone has a bloodstain to hide. Picking out the broker link in this chain misses the forest for the trees.
By ‘brokers’, particularly in the Filipino migrant worker context, I was specifically thinking about companies that recruit and place blue collar labour (like the Thai workers in the current THRC issue) and care-givers, household help and personal family nurses.[/quote] That is who my coments were about.[quote=“ed”]I have read elsewhere that they are a ‘necessary evil’ - fine. But let’s focus on the first part, “necessary”. How are high school and college graduates in the Philippines, Vietnam, Indonesia, India, and other countries, supposed to find jobs outside of their countries?[/quote]Pretty much the same as qualifies applicants everywhere else. Newspaper, the internet (The PI is pretty wired now) and the most common way - Word of Mouth. I would also like to see the PI gov’t expand its work in the Pacific Rim and Middle East to at least match its help with overseas workers going to the USA.
I also believe that one is entitled to all their earnings. What’s tricky here is understanding who determines how much is enough.[/quote]No big deal here Ed, its called “Prevailing wage.” If NT$500 per hour is the agreed upon wage - thats what is paid. STandard work-day is 8 hours, this can be flexible per worker/emploter agreement. Same with days off and sick/holidayss. And it should be the responsibility of the placement agent/broker to ensure that any agreements are being honored. Not all that hard to establish. If the agent/broker does not bserve the responsibilities thay lose their license to act in this capacity.[quote=“ed”]In the case of some Filipino migrants, what you might consider are slave labor wages here are in fact 3 or 4 times what they would earn for similar work in Manila.[/quote]Irrelevant Ed. We are speaking of the labor contract agreement here on Taiwan.[quote=“ed”]Now, imagine the earning disparity to the provinces of the Philippines.[/quote]]What percentage is there in wanting to keep the status quo? Are you suggesting that these PI workers are not deserving of bettering their future? C’mon Ed…thats not your message is it Ed?[quote=“ed”]
This reminds me of the argument of many anti-globalization activists in North America (you wouldn’t happen to be a tree-hugger, would you?), who complain about the exploitation of workers in the 3rd world - like Nike factories in Southeast Asia.[/quote]No tree-hugger; but I find its better in the long run to make things win-win from the get go…as it were.(a terrible phrase)[quote=“ed”]The flip side - pardon the pun - is that there workers who are happily earning more than they would under normal conditions, but at wage levels that are still below what the activist would consider ‘normal’.[/quote]Not an "activist Ed.[quote=“ed”] And these same workers would be rather unhappy that Nike must restrict its activities and operations as a result of the activists’s efforts.[/quote]Ed, a common dismissal argument. If there was not a real problem, yhere would not be a real solution. Anyway, this is not about some Nike sweat shop in VN or in some Pacific island banana kingdom. I’m discussing Filipinos coming to Taiwan to teach english. And, as this has expanded, domestics and contract workers.[quote=“ed”]Here’s an added twist. Even if the Philippines and Taiwan threw open their borders to one another (say they built a bridge connecting their 2 main islands), I bet there would still be a role and use for the dastardly middlemen you speak of.[/quote]Maybe, maybe not. If there is, one could hope that they are observing basic levels of human rights in their endeavors. Face it, these workers are viewed as “lower class humans” by most of the Taiwanese who hire them and the agents who exploit them. Until this changes all of this is just p*ssing in the wind.
[quote=“Josefus”]Just how long did that take you to write?[/quote]Josefus -
Writing was only a few minutes.
The damn formatting and spell checking seemed like all damn night…lol.
[quote=“ed”][quote=“puiwaihin”]But let’s concentrate on the second part of the term: “evil”.
What justifies taking a year’s pay from someone?[/quote]
I imagine the only justification is the willingness of one party to give one year’s pay - in exchange for the what they will earn for the other 5 years. Altogether, what they could earn in these 6 years in Taiwan would likely be far far more than what they would earn in 6 years at home.[/quote]
Of course. In order to make twice as much as you could earn at home you have to work for a year for someone else for free first. Do that for three years and you will have benefited your family.
So, you want to move to the New World and escape the oppression? Well, you just gotta give 7 years of your life to the person who pays your passage.
So, you want to drive your car to the nearest town and the local gas station has jacked their price up to $99 a gallon? But you have no gas in your car and you’ve got to get to work. Well, like it or not, you’re going to pay. You could stay at home, but that would end up costing you your job. So you put in one gallon today so you can get far enough to get to a cheaper place.
The fact that a person is willing to accept such conditions because they are required to get something else does not justify the person making these sorts of demand. Forcing people to accept what’s good for you because you have the power and they don’t is not justified by their acceptance.
Does this government agency match employees and employers? No, they don’t. They leave it up to a third party who is out to make money. You could put OWWA in charge of matching employers and employees instead of private business.
Now, is this the best solution? Perhaps not, but you were asking for something that could replace the brokerages completely.
Personally, I think better laws and oversight would be fine, but you still don’t need profit-taking middle-men. That was my point.
That is not a result of the government being involved, that’s a result of corruption in the system. That’s what I’m arguing against- the system that perpetrates the inequality. Government needs to do things right and protect their people by controlling the middlemen.
Filling a need isn’t evil. Taking advantage of those in need is. I have not seen any sort of agency thus far that is serving the needs of the Phillipinas.
Certainly not. We’re talking about regulations that serve to keep the workers under the thumb of agencies so that the agencies continue to make money off of them even after they have been matched with an employer.
Of course. There are runaways. There are bad workers. That’s why you require references and then people who act that way don’t get hired again. That’s why you include incentives to complete a contract. But that isn’t what we’re talking about here.
Anyway, I’m not for Phillipinas being brought over to teach English since I feel that there are enough local teahers qualified for the job. But I am very interested in equal treatment and seeing people don’t get exploited. Probably comes from being ashamed of my ancestors or something.
If they had to pay the Filipinos the same as the Westerners then they’d only keep the Filipino around until they could find a Westerner they could exchange them with. Given the choice of choosing a Filipino or a NATIVE speaker at the same price…who’s going to choose the non-native speaker? Giving them a reduced pay gives them a fighting chance in the market.
North Luzon, up by Laoag, has no shortage of Chinese heritage. This is Marcos territory (his father was Chinese) and there is no shortage of signage in Chinese. Many of the folks from this part of the PI probably qualify for ROC citizenship one way or another as they are part of the Han Diaspora. While up that way I heard the term “Chinoy” (which is also the CNN guy’s last name) which means Chinese- Pinoy literally Chinese-Filipino.
Sterling Seagrave has a book about Marcos et al that is every bit as fascinating as “Lords of the Rim” and “The Soong Dynasty” which IIRC is titled something akin to “The Marcos Dynasty”
[quote=“puiwaihin”]Forcing people to accept what’s good for you because you have the power and they don’t is not justified by their acceptance.
[/quote]
Just thought I’d quote this in case anybody missed it the first time.
“Come one, come all. YOU can teach English for $1000 US/month. Great opportunity to make and save some money! If you don’t mind living in a 6 by 6 box and peeing in a Pepsi bottle, you can potentially save $6 to 700 US a month!”
It seems I am the only Filipino around, to defend all the accusations against my RACE, if that is how it should be viewed here. Well, come on and come all. Pitch all your accusations against my land.
What is so unusual about a Filipino having to teach English? I am a Filipino in Taipei, and I am in a position to describe the outward racism my countrymen face in this tiny island.
Taiwan being the northern neighbor of the Philippines, is every bit determined to put itself above the Filipinos who it sees as lower beings. One cannot blame all these on the Taiwanese, because Filipinos have been working here for decades as nannies and the Chinese in Taiwan has stereotyped the Filipinos as such. And it occurs to the Chinese in Taiwan as a surprise that the lowly monkeys can speak a highly-touted language far better than they do. Of course, because of their relative isolation as a result of constant Chinese interverence on their diplomatic affairs, they had not been aware of what’s happening around the world, even right at their southern doorstep!
And to save face, from the humiliation of monkeys teaching the descendans of confucius, there goes the legislation mandating only caucasian people are capable of teaching English in Taiwan.
and i saw a nanny the other day pushing an incapacitated old Chinese woman in Zhongli. The Taiwanese should thank the Filipinos for being kind, i thought to myself. Otherwise, I just wonder what will happen to that old woman
Nothing at all, in fact Filipino maids have been doing it unofficially and for peanuts for quite a long time.
Yes but, do remember they were beating down your doors not so long ago looking to be nannies in the Philippines. They’ve clearly forgotten but smile, one day, if you can shake of that lecherous compradour class that has almost signgle-handedly driven your country to the boundary, they’ll be back.
As for stuff mentioned here, I do think among teachers there is the concern they’ll be outsourced by lower paid - cos that’s what these low-margin cram schools will do - Filipino teachers. Job security quickwolf, it’s the bane of migrants all over the world.
It has nthing to do with race, it’s all about being a native speaker.
Having the very thought should exclude you from caring for anybody!
Well, someone best hurry up and tell the ABCs and CBCs and the blacks and Latinos that they can’t teach either. We’re ALL monkeys here.
[quote]
It seems I am the only Filipino around, to defend all the accusations against my RACE, if that is how it should be viewed here. Well, come on and come all. Pitch all your accusations against my land. [/quote]
Perhaps you haven’t met Goose Egg, the co-owner of this site. Guess where he’s from?
Well let me be the second Pinoy to post about this (albeit a born and bred in London one).
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think the majority of posts on this thread are being entirely disrespectful to Filipinos. There are some posts that seem to be mocking what they think is “Filipino” English to those people (pilet of pish)… well, there are many eloquent and well trained Pinoy teachers who compare favourably with Sharon the waitress at the east London Pie and Mash shop, or Jimbob and his mullet who lives in a trailer.
Not many university-educated trained teachers of English speak with the same accent as those who didn’t for some reason finish school. Talk to the Filipinos at your local church, do University educated Pinoys have the same accent as non-uni educated ones?
On the whole the attachments to this idea are what bring up questions.
1: The issues that will come from paying half to (what presumably will be) professional, trained teachers. (Is it dignified? Does it show the innovators of this idea to be racist?)
2: How they are to be recruited. (will it be the same as the way other SE Asians are presently recruited- through agencies? Why can’t they come and apply for jobs themselves the same way as holders of US-UK etc passports? etc.)
3: Why not open this opportunity to anyone qualified regardless of nationality?
and err, I can’t remember now… its late
anyway, it’s not underway yet… it’ll be interesting to see what actually happens… the government might even surprise us
Oh no! That reads really bad, especially with a dancing Bush avatar and a cheesy smilie. It’s not what I meant, well, not that way.
I am sure that there are many people from the Phillipines that speak brilliant English. I am sure that amoungst those people there will be those that have better grammar than most native speakers. I am also very sure that there will be a small number that have an accent suitable for teaching English that is both pleasant to listen to and easy to understand. That’s not slamming a country, that’s more of a reality. Those few, I would hire. The same could be said for certain groups inside every country. I probably wouldn’t hire someone from Taiwan that had learnt English in New Zealand, even though I am from NZ. Why? The accent, or over expression of it, makes me crazy. Then again, there are many that don’t fit that sterotype. Those people, I would hire.
The simple reality is that many people from the Philipines don’t have a good enough level of English to teach. Even those with proper credentials can be found to be lacking in important areas.
I will make these points very clear…
It is NOT about your race.
It is NOT about the color of your skin.
It is NOT about what country you come from (but the country that you come from may have influenced the reason why you MAY NOT be suitable for a teaching position).
You get to, as far as I am concerned, if I were hiring, get to compete on a LEVEL playing field…
Is your accent easy to understand?
Are you pleasant to listen to?
Are you, for the most part, gramatically correct?
Can you teach?
Are you teachable?
Do you meet the requirements to get a work permit?
Are you lacking a major chip on your shoulder which could impair your day to day interactions with people?
Do you have passion for what you do?
Do you believe in yourself?
Are you going to be able to meet the minimum performance requirements of the position?
That is what would get you a job.
However, if you aren’t a ‘native’ English speaker, you may need to work a little harder at meeting the public relations side of the position. Let’s face it, schools are here to make money and do so by getting and retaining students. You must be able to do this. Bums on seats. That is a simple requirement for ANY teacher. We can not be held accountable for small minded locals, although A SCHOOL SHOULD SUPPORT TEACHERS THAT THEY HIRE. So, it may be a little more difficult for a non-native English speaker from a “non-standard” English speaking country. There is no point in trying to paint a pretty picture about this situation in Taiwan. It’s a fact. Why should a school kill the business that it has built just to be PC. Sorry, it’s a tough reality, but nonetheless a reality. A Taiwan reality.
Back to my original statement. If someone from the Philipines could speak English to the same level as a local English teacher, I would probably have hired them in some capacity. If that teacher could speak, read and write Chinese, I would certainly have hired them. I don’t mean to the same level as a Taiwanese, but to an acceptable level. That being said, we did hire a Filipino that spoke Chinese, but the parents insisted that she never speak Chinese because they didn’t want their kids speaking poor Chinese. But they didn’t seem to have a problem with me speaking chinese. That wasn’t fair at all.
I hope I have clarified things a little clearer. I hated my first post on this topic. I am much happier with this one.
[/quote]Maybe, maybe not. If there is, one could hope that they are observing basic levels of human rights in their endeavors. Face it, these workers are viewed as “lower class humans” by most of the Taiwanese who hire them and the agents who exploit them. Until this changes all of this is just p*ssing in the wind.
It’s not what I meant, well, not that way.