Kuala Lumpur: Self-employment or gig job opportunities should be promoted as the career of choice for job seekers, given the growing importance of the gig economy.
According to the Economic Outlook 2021 report released by the Ministry of Finance, self-employment can be a viable option for job seekers and initiatives should be focused on generating more job creators through entrepreneurship opportunities.
Nevertheless, structured and comprehensive regulations and social safety net need to be in place to safeguard the workers’ wellbeing, especially during economic downturns.
“As entrepreneur generally face difficulties in securing loans, financial institutions and relevant agencies may facilitate entrepreneurs applying for soft-loans or matching grants and others business support programmes,” it said.
The report said the Covid-19 pandemic has also brought changes to the employment landscape from traditional full-time employment to short-term and more flexible employment.
“Gig works have become predominantly important to the economy and gig workers are likely to have better income prospect,” it said.
However, unlike paid employees, many of the self-employed, including gig workers, are lacking access to social security protection, such as insurance benefits and pensions and are not covered by labour legislation.
“As an immediate strategy, all self-employed including gig workers should make a mandatory contribution to social security protection under the Self-Employment Social Security Act 2017 (Act 789).
“This will entitle them to receive assistance, especially during unprecedented economic downturns,” the report said.
Meanwhile, the report also said that underemployment or educational mismatch remains a common long-standing structural issue in many countries, including Malaysia.
“The 2019 Graduates Tracer Study by Ministry of Higher Education indicated that 30.6 per cent of the respondents with tertiary education were underemployed,” it said.
“The lack of job creation, particularly for skilled occupations, seems to be the main contributing factor to the phenomenon.
“A prolonged mismatch indicates that the potential of the educated workforce has not been fully optimised for economic growth, thus limiting the nation’s economic potential,” the report said.
Thus, all stakeholders including industries, learning institutions and government agencies need to closely collaborate to harness the full potential of its human capital.
The Malaysian economy is expected to rebound firmly in 2021 in line with the expectation of more synchronised global recovery.
At the same time, domestic demand is projected to record steady growth, supported by improvements in labour market conditions, low inflation and favourable financing conditions as well as the revival of major infrastructure projects.
