Vietnam - Workers struggle to make ends meet

Low incomes and the insecurity of a life away from home force many local workers to consider taking temporary jobs at foreign-invested enterprises.

Nguyen Tan Tai has worked for three foreign companies since he started his isolated life at Thang Long Industrial Park in Hanoi three years ago.

The 22-year-old shifted his job at Japan’s ToTo Group to Suncall Technology Vietnam Ltd and is now working for Japan’s Atsumitec Vietnam Company, a firm that manufactures gear-boxes for automakers.

With his job at Atsumitec, Tai makes just VND2.9 million ($139) a month or $5.5 per working day.

“It’s very difficult to live on such a small salary. Most of my money is spent on food, rent and transport fees. The price of everything is climbing,” said Tai.

His roommate Pham Van Thang earns the same amount of money each month. “With this amount of money, I have enough to cover cost of living for three weeks. Every month, I am always waiting for the tenth when I got salary,” said Thang, who is working for Showa, a company that produces motorbike components in Thang Long Industrial Park.

This thin worker with dyed brown hair believes his life will be better if he returns to hometown and finds a job like bricklaying. “I would like to have a self-reliant life and be separate from my parents and that’s why I continue staying here. But in the future, when I get married and need a stable life, this job will not help me,” said Thang.

Tens of thousands of Vietnamese workers are employed at Thang Long Industrial Park and many of them have similar thoughts to Thang and Tai. Although salaries in Vietnam are on the rise, today’s employees say these higher wages do not equate to easier living. Soaring inflation and housing costs are hitting workers hard, making it difficult for them to support their loved ones.

A survey conducted by the Vietnam General Confederation of Labour’s Institute of Workers and Trade Union shows that this year’s average monthly income for a worker at foreign-invested enterprise (FIE) in the first zone covering Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City is VND3.1 million ($150).

By comparison, monthly average incomes at domestic private and state-owned enterprises are VND3.5 million ($168.2) and VND5.6 million ($269.2), respectively.

More than one-third of the workers said they could not afford to cover living costs while 44.7 per cent said they had to spend sparingly, according to the survey. Some 18 per cent said they just earned a living and less than 2 per cent of FIE employees said they could save a part of their monthly earnings.

Because of these low incomes, 39.6 per cent of workers at FIEs were not satisfied with their current jobs and wanted to find better paid work, the survey found. Only 4.8 per cent of FIE employees said they felt satisfied with their wages.

“Most people quit jobs here and return hometown when they get married. I saw many people leave here even though they were still single. There is only one reason - low wages,” said Nguyen Quoc Dai, who has been working in Thang Long Industrial Park for four years.

At present, the real gross monthly incomes of workers in FIEs are about 30 per cent higher than the minimum wage.

Panasonic, for example, offers workers a maximum income of VND3.51 million ($169) per month. Of this VND2.45 million ($117) is basic salary while the rest comes in the form of allowances like housing rent, transport costs, environment pollution allowance and overtime payments, according to a recruitment announcement sticker on billboard at the gate of Thang Long.

But Canon – a well-known manufacturer of printers, cameras and other electronic equipment – offers a lower income. According to a recruitment announcement of this employer, the maximum income of a worker working at Canon is VND2.9 million ($139), of which VND2 million ($96.1) is basic salary, a level equal to minimum salary regulated by the government since October 1.

Getting one’s hands on the maximum income at these companies is not easy though.

“When I was interviewed to work for Atsumitec one year ago, it said my maximum income was VND3.2 million ($153), but I have never received that amount of money,” said Tai.

He added foreign employers had lots of tactics to pay workers as little as possible. “You will reach the maximum income if you live 20 kilometres away from the factory since you will then have an additional VND450,000 in transport allowance. But we are immigrant workers from the countryside, and we have to stay near the factory,” said this worker who comes from Vinh Phuc province.

Tai and Thang are now living in a dingy one-room flat where they have to pay VND800,000 ($38.4) each month. And they have to share a toilet with workers living in eight other rooms. Their room comprises a bed of two planks, two trunks full of clothes and a portable gas cooker. “We never lock this room when go out because we have nothing to lose,” said Thang.

After three years of work, he has not saved any money. “I dream of one day having a small house here, but with the income I’m making now, I will never succeed,” Thang said. “It’s hard to imagine the future with the wage we are making. Living and working like this, my life has no direction,” said 23-year-old Son, one of Thang’s neighbours.

The recent minimum salary hike by the government saw Son getting an additional VND400,000 ($19.2) each month, but this is not enough to get by. “The most expensive thing I have bought is a VND3 million, Chinese mobile phone,” said Son. But to buy this, he had to save for almost a year.

In Son’s view, most of the people benefiting from the investment of foreign investors in Vietnam are people like his landlord. “All they have to do is sitting at home and taking our money by raising electricity charges and rent,” said Son.

Even love is difficult for these workers on low incomes. Tai laughed when asked if he liked to go out in his spare time or chase after some of the many young women who also work in the industrial park.

“I don’t make enough money to go out eating and drinking,” he said, adding that he has never thought about loving someone here. “If you want to find a girlfriend, then it will cost more money.

I want to find a girlfriend and get married in my hometown where I can afford a stable life for my family,” he said.

Ngoc Linh | vir.com.vn

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