Defending a legislated wage increase is not just merely a result of one?s bleeding heart for the impoverished but has compelling empirical data that are interpreted in a way that seriously considers the rights and welfare of workers.
DAVAO CITY — Sometime in the ?80s, Annie Yanagida went to Japan to work as an entertainer, one of the thousands who go to that country each year to seek greener pasture.
But unlike most Filipina entertainers in Japan, Annie, who graduated from the Holy Cross of Davao College, saw other opportunities. After marrying a Japanese, she put up Annie?s English School, which she has been nurturing for the past 20years.
The story of Elmer Jacinto, the Basilan native who topped the 2004 medical board exams but ended up as a nurse in New York, continues to fascinate people. In this story, by the AP’s Adam Geller, Jacinto makes no apologies for his decision that stunned people.
There’s a raging debate now about the recent passage by Congress of a 125-peso across-the-board salary increase. On the one hand, workers and unionists insist that this increase, such as it is, is long overdue. On the other hand, businesses have denounced the increase as not only a product of political posturing by congressmen (to curry favor from the public in this year’s election) but also harmful to the economy in the long run.
We revisit some of our stories on this issue.
Poverty, hunger, violent demolitions, and lack of social services and basic utilities continue to plague the urban poor. And things are getting worse. In fact, the Philippines was adjudged by the Geneva-based Centre on Housing Rights and Eviction (COHRE) as one of three recipients, together with Nigeria and Greece, of the Housing Rights Violator Award ?for their systematic violation of housing rights and continued failure to abide by their international legal obligations.?