SMU Professor of Economics Hoon Hian Teck was interviewed for a Sunday Times article which looked at how the Progressive Wage Model has benefited workers in the cleaning, security and landscaping sectors, and what challenges it faces, four years after it was mooted. Prof Hoon examined the average growth rate of gross wages, including employers' Central Provident Fund contributions, for full-time resident cleaners, labourers and related workers. From 2008 to 2012 - the year the wage ladder was first announced - this was 2.6 per cent. From 2013 to last year, it was 7.3 per cent. However, Prof Hoon, cautioned that other factors could be at play, such as fewer foreign workers in the same period. He added: "This could also have put an upward pressure on wage earnings."
