KUALA LUMPUR: While Budget 2024 has several goodies to encourage women to remain in the workforce as well as to return to work, experts are saying the announcement fell far short of expectations.
Budget 2024 extends TalentCorp’s Career Comeback Tax Exemption programme until December 31, 2027, with the Prime Minister also recommending that the income tax exemption limit on childcare allowances received by employees or paid directly by employers to childcare centres be increased from RM2,400 to RM3,000 in order to reach the 60% female labour participation rate (FLPR).
The incentives come at a time when women have not been able to return to the workforce as well as men after Covid-19 upended things. This is despite women comprising 61% of university graduates but making up about a third of workers.
Women’s labour participation rate only returned to pre-Covid levels of 55.6% in 2022, according to the Statistics Department Malaysia (DoSM).
“The intention is good. You also want to encourage and make it easier to provide more support for women to go back to work. But the budget being given or allocated falls short,” said Dr Lai Suat Yan, senior lecturer with the gender studies programme at the University of Malaya.
Economist Datuk Dr Madeline Berma agreed, saying the incentives were not what many women were expecting and did not go deep enough to address the problems women face.
She told Bernama the incentives had been tried before, with mixed results, as some employers baulked at putting in childcare facilities in buildings despite the government offering tax incentives.
“Anything to do with women and family, it is seen more as a cost (by employers) than an investment,” she said.
On top of current incentives in 2024 Budget, Berma and others said they would have liked to see the budget address the formation of a care economy in Malaysia, which would go a long way to address the reasons why women drop out of the workforce in the first place.,
“For women to go back to work, one of the biggest impediments or barriers is actually the care work that they do. But other than children, as Malaysia is heading towards an ageing nation - the care of the elderly, on whose shoulder does the care all?” said Dr Lai, adding that women were also expected to help care for disabled family members.
Experts like her argue that the focus should not just be on providing childcare assistance but also eldercare and others.
“For this to work, a care infrastructure needs to be there,” said Dr Lai, who added that the care economy includes building care facilities, private and public, and recognising and training workers to provide care services.
Asia Foundation’s senior policy advisor Ahmad Ikram Abdullah said there was a huge demand for professional and standardised care work, which will only grow as the Malaysian population ages.
“(Care economy provides) a solution to the need for care workers, but look at it also as potential economic growth in the country where there is potential to provide jobs and services,” he said, adding that he expected the private sector to be the primary driver in developing the care economy.
Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM) senior lecturer Dr Zaireeni Azmi said professionalising care work can introduce accountability to an industry that is typically unregulated, adding this can have positive effects on the economy, as workers will be compensated based on their qualifications.
“If you professionalise the care economy, then wages will not be low.
“Right now, the wages are low because of unlicensed and untrained workers,” she said.
