Base salary hike brings both joy, concern to community

The topic of base salary growth has so far been the most common among labor groups. Most express their eagerness to wait for the effective date of the regulation because this means a rise of pension and social welfare as well.

Truong My Phuong, an official at the Statistics Office of the People’s Committee in Hiep Binh Chanh Ward of Thu Duc City, shared that this is a great encouragement to her and her colleagues, who are now enduring a heavy workload serving more than 104,000 local residents in the ward. She stressed that this new salary would help her to afford better commodities for daily operations in her family, and that the incentive news boosts her willingness to increase performance to better serve the community.

However, Tran Thi Thu An, a civil servant in charge of justice – household registration in the People’s Committee of An Phu Dong Ward in District 12, voiced her concern that the new base salary would also lead to increases in the prices of common commodities, which means functional agencies should devise feasible solutions to stabilize the market. Otherwise, this salary rise is meaningless.

Tran Thanh Nga, an employee in Nidec Vietnam Co. Ltd. (sited in Saigon Hi-tech Park in Thu Duc City), happily shared that she is welcoming the monthly salary rise of 6 percent from July 1 as well as increases in both pension and social welfare, showing greater fairness to laborers in different regions of the country. She further explained that the current salary of the couple is sufficient to pay for her family of four members, and thus the increased amount is saved for possible negative incidents in the future.

Chairman Pham Trung Hieu of the People’s Committee of Hiep Thanh Ward in District 12 affirmed that the salary increase will contribute to creating motivation for contribution among civil servants, public officials, and other employees.

He believes that in order to make the salary increase even more meaningful, more fundamental solutions are needed to relieve the pressure on officials in densely populated localities. For example, Hiep Thanh Ward has a population of over 106,000 people, but the number of civil servants is only more than wards with a population of 50,000 by two. Therefore, he hopes that HCMC will apply additional mechanisms to increase the number of administrative civil servants, especially in areas that directly work with the people.

Head Bui Lam Giang of the Organization – Administration – Management Department under the HCMC Cadre Academy said that the salary increase from July 1 will bring excitement and create motivation for civil servants and public officials who are receiving salaries from the budget. This is also the basis for state agencies to promote the implementation of a number of solutions to improve the quality of public services.

It is necessary to build regulations for evaluating the ability of officials and employees to perform their assigned tasks in order to increase salaries and bonuses appropriately to avoid unfairness for young, enthusiastic officials and employees who do their job well and do not engage in negativity or corruption. State agencies and units also need to strictly control the income of public officials and other employees, limit the payment of illegal income other than salaries when performing tasks.

According to Head Bui Lam Giang, currently, most agencies and units mainly evaluate civil servants and public officials in relation to bonuses; however, this evaluation should be linked to salaries. Only then can salary reform be in-depth and truly successful.

Luu Duc Quang from the University of Economics and Law (Vietnam National University-HCM) commented that while the new salary reform policy based on job positions has not yet been implemented, an increase in the base salary is necessary. Salary increases in the public sector are a factor that helps to improve the quality of public service execution.

He then proposed that state agencies should closely follow the Job Position Project and the structure of civil servants and public officials according to job positions in administrative agencies, organizations, and public non-profit units that the Ministry of Home Affairs has instructed. Determining job positions in a practical way is the basis for applying the agency's quantity of full-time positions.

In addition, competent authorities must strongly decentralize so that heads of public non-profit units can adjust additional income for public officials and other employees. This is where the majority of those who receive salaries from the state budget are located.

Chairman Hoang Tho Dieu of District 1 Veterans Association shared that the 30-percent base salary rise and 15-percent growth in pension and social welfare bring immense joy to civil servants, public employees, and the retired since their capacity to afford daily operations increases. This could also mean additional resources for them to join in voluntary activities.

Yet in a long term, to gain sustainable improvements in the income of civil servants and public employees, it is necessary to accelerate the implementation of Resolution No.27 about salary reform, to devise feasible solution to stabilize the market in order to minimize the case of salary rises cannot catch up with commodities price increases.