Labor Sector in the Philippines:

A Look on its Social and Political Landscape

"Give me about 3 to 6 months; I will get rid of corruption, drugs & criminality”
"The moment I assume the presidency, contractualization will stop"
"Wala akong pangako na hindi ko natupad except 'yang EDSA"

- President Rodrigo Duterte

I. Labor Code of the Philippines

The Labor Code of the Philippines acts as the governing law of all the
employment practices and labor relations in the country. It was made effective under
Presidential Decree No. 442 of 19741 by the power of the late president Ferdinand
Marcos, in the exercise of his then extant dictatorial powers. With respect to the
provisions in the 1987 Philippine Constitution2, this Code prescribes the rules for hiring
and termination of private employees; the conditions of work including maximum work
hours and overtime; employee benefits such as holiday pay, thirteenth month pay and
retirement pay; and the guidelines in the organization and membership in labor unions
as well as in collective bargaining.

Pre-employment policies enshrined in the Code include the minimum employable

age that is 18 years old and above. Persons of age under 15-18 is allowed to work with
certain conditions that they are prohibited to work in hazardous working environment.
As for overseas employment, foreign employers cannot hire Filipino employees directly
without the authority of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration. On the

1 PD NO 442 OF 1974, AS AMENDED AND RENUMBERED A Decree Instituting a Labor Code Thereby
Revising and Consolidating Labor and Social Laws to Afford Protection to Labor, Promote Employment
and Human Resources Development and Insure Industrial Peace Based on Social Justice
2 See also the policy declarations in Sec. 3, Art. XIII of the 1987 Constitution of the Republic of the

Philippines
regular conditions of employment, the minimum wage, regular working hours and rest
days, night shift differentials, overtime pay policies, and household helpers are defined.

As stated in the Code, the normal hours of work an employee has to render must
not exceed eight (8) hours a day and should be exclusive of the one (1) hour daily lunch
break. Philippine laws, however, do not prohibit work done for less than eight hours.
Every employer is mandated by the Labor Code to give their employees not less than
sixty (60) minutes’ time-off for their regular meals. During day shifts, this time-off is
usually during 12:00 PM. Also, every employee shall be paid a night shift premium of
not less than 10% of their regular wage for each hour of work performed between 10:00
PM and 6:00 AM. Work may be performed beyond eight hours a day provided that the
employee is paid for the overtime work, which consists of an additional compensation
equivalent to his regular wage plus at least 25% thereof. Work performed beyond eight
hours on a holiday or rest day shall be paid an additional compensation equivalent to
the rate of the first eight hours plus at least 30% thereof.

It shall be the duty of every employer to provide each of his employees a rest
period of not less than twenty-four (24) consecutive hours after every six (6)
consecutive normal work days. During holidays, every worker shall be paid his regular
daily wage during regular holidays, except in retail and service establishments regularly
employing less than 10 workers; the employer may require an employee to work on any
holiday but such employee shall be paid a compensation equivalent to twice his regular
rate.

These are just some of the protections under the Code workers should have
been enjoying. But with personal and political interests of big corporations, these rights
are at stake, and workers are experiencing the suffering.

II. Overview of the Labor Force and Labor Market

The labor force population consists of the employed and the unemployed 15
years old and above. Philippines is among one of the Asia’s powerhouses of labor
markets as it houses a large and thickening population of labor force with a median age
of 23. A recent study of ASEAN Briefing reveals that about 44.1 million people out of
70.9 million who aged 15 years and above have now entered the labor force.

On Employment, Unemployment, and Underemployment3

The country’s labor force continued to improve, recording increased employment

and lower underemployment in July 2019, the National Economic and Development
Authority said. The July round of the Labor Force Survey (LFS) of the Philippine
Statistics Authority showed that employment growth rate increased in April 2019 was
estimated at 94.9%, higher than the 94.5% recorded a year ago.

This translates to 2.3 million additional employments, almost five times the
479,000 employment generated in the same period last year. The total number of
employed Filipinos reached nearly 43.0 million in July 2019 on account of stronger
employment in the services (6.1% from 4.7% in 2018) and agriculture sectors (7.6%
from -7.4% in 2018).
On the other hand, unemployment rate was at 5.1 percent, which remained to be
the lowest unemployment rate recorded for all April rounds of the survey since 2009.
The figure is equivalent to some 74,000 people getting jobs.
Meanwhile, underemployment rate – the proportion of those already employed
but still wanting more work – fell to its lowest rate in all July rounds of the survey at 13.5
percent, from year-ago’s 17 percent. This translates to a reduction of over a million
underemployed workers in July 2019. The figure is equivalent to some 1.26 million
fewer underemployed persons for the period.

On Overseas Employment

On Youth unemployment, job and skill mismatch, educated unemployed

III. Challenges on the Labor Sector

3 https://www.rappler.com/business/232324-employment-rate-philippines-april-2019
 The Labor Code of the Philippines is the law that governs employment practices
including the labor relations in the Philippines. But despite the legislative effort to secure
the rights of the workers to better wages, working conditions, tenure, etc., the workers
are still in no guarantee that these efforts would protect them. In fact, aside from
bagging the gold medal for being one of the top violators of human rights according to
Amnesty International, the insincerity of the Duterte administration to curb the current
labor crisis in the country has made the Philippines to rank again in the world index
scene.
In the 2018 study of World Worker’s Rights Index 20184, Philippines belonged to
the top ten worst countries for workers in 2018. Aside from the Philippines, other
countries include: Algeria, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Colombia, Egypt, Guatemala,
Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. (Internation Trade Union Confederation, 2018) In
the context of extreme violence and suppression of civil and political liberties, workers
and trade unionist has been facing threats and intimidations and inhumane treatment
from the government itself which is supposed to give them utmost protection.

It must be noted that during 2016 Presidential elections, candidates were

outspoken to end contractualization if ever they win.

On Contractualization 5

Endo is an illegal form of contractualization, wherein workers are repeatedly

retrenched and rehired by companies for the purpose of circumventing their
regularization. Currently, loopholes in the current labor law allow for labor contracting
companies to supply client firms with workers for jobs that are considered in core

4 The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) is a confederation of national trade union
centres, each of which links trade unions of that particular country. It was established on 1 November
2006, bringing together the organisations which were formerly affiliated to the ICFTU and WCL (both now
dissolved) as well as a number of national trade union centres which had no international affiliation at the
time. The Confederation has 331 affiliated organisation in 163 countries and territories on all five
continents, with a membership of 207 million, 40 per cent of whom are women. It is also a partner in
“Global Unions” together with the Trade Union Advisory Committee to the OECD and the Global Union
Federations (GUFs) which link together national unions from a particular trade or industry at international
level. The ITUC has specialised offices in a number of countries around the world, and has General
Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations.
5 https://www.philstar.com/business/2019/05/28/1921357/more-challenges-labor-sector
positions. In the same breath, some labor contracting companies are able to keep most
of their workers as casuals, and in the process, limit their core employees to a handful
in order to reduce costs associated with social benefits such as health and retirement.

While the Senate had unanimously passed a bill that aims to strengthen security
of tenure6 and end illegal contracting of Filipino workers, this will have to be harmonized
in the upcoming bicameral sessions with the House version, which reportedly has
ideologically opposing provisions.

VETO

As far as Malacañang is concerned, no one should be blamed for President

Rodrigo Duterte's decision to veto the security of tenure or "anti-endo" bill, saying it's
part of the process of policy-making.

"Yung finger-pointing, huwag na natin gawin 'yun. Palagi tayong maging bukas.
Kung sa tingin natin nagkulang tayo, eh di punuan natin (Let's stop finger-pointing. Let's
always be open. If we think we had shortcomings, let's make up for them)," Presidential
Spokesman Salvador Panelo said in a news briefing on Thursday, August 1.

In his veto message, Duterte said the bill did not adequately protect the rights of
employers and management. In the days leading to his decision, influential business
groups asked him to veto the measure even as ending labor-only contracting was his
main promise to Filipino workers.

6HB No 4444: An Act Strengthening Workers Right to Security of Tenure, Amending for the Purpose
Articles 106 to 109 of Book III, Articles 294 (279) to 296 (281) of Book VI, and Article 303 (288) of Book
VII of Presidential Decree No. 422, Otherwise known as the Labor Code of the Philippines, As Amended.
 The striking workers of Pepmaco, NutriAsia and Monde-Nissin and others remind
us how severe the problem of contractualization is -- three years after the President
promised to stop it, and two weeks after he vetoed a bill that sought to regulate it.

On Higher Labor Cost

On Foreign Labor
The revolting reality of the Philippines' labor export policy. More than they are
heroes as romanticized by the government and the media, our overseas workers are
victims of an economy which has time and again failed them and their families back
home.

House Bill 48027

Recently last week, October 18, 2019, labor groups Defend Job Philippines,
Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (TUCP), and Bukluran ng Manggagawang
Pilipino (BMP) rejected House Bill 4802 filed by Probinsyano Ako partylist
representative Jose "Bonito" Singson, denouncing it as a "cheap trick" to deprive
workers of their right to regularization and benefits. Labor groups rejected a proposed
House bill seeking to extend the probationary period of workers over 3 times from 6
months to 2 years, warning that its implementation would only worsen
contractualization. Bukluran ng Manggagawa said that the bill illustrates how our
lawmakers are completely out of touch with the conditions of the ordinary Filipinos and
seek to further aggravate them.

However, Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III says the current 6-month
probationary period is enough for employers to determine workers' qualifications, and
extending it would encourage contractualization. According to him, delaying a worker's

7
assurance of permanent employment is no longer in keeping with the administration's
policy on security of tenure

On Output Growth

On Wage
The wage rate in the Philippines is way behind those in other countries

On Inhumane Treatments and Poor Working Condition

Directly related to poor working conditions are oppressive practices inflicted on

workers by employers who look down on labor as mere material instruments of capital
accumulation. Forced to suffer under poor working conditions in exchange for
unemployment and eventual starvation, Filipino workers have long been deprived of the
right to life and duty to work.

Inadequate physical facilities and occupational safety measures exposure to

hazardous chemicals, unreasonable work schedule, unjust compensation, inadequate
leave benefits, limited, if not absence of opportunity for personal and professional
growth, and unstable employment status – these are but a few of the unjust working
conditions that burden Filipino workers.

Citing one case. PEPMACO workers suffer exposure to extreme heat and
harmful chemicals without safety gear, lack of benefits & health facilities, 12+ hours of
work and 7 days a week, 0 leaves even for pregnant women, and unjust termination.
This is not an isolated case. Hundreds of workers have already stood up against the
maltreatment of their superiors, but their conditions will never get better until the end of
contractualization and the standardization of liveable salary.
 Inhumane practices of employers include failure to implement wages and
compensations as prescribed by law, sexual harassments, physical abuses, illegal
dismissals, and other problems emanating from poor working conditions

Not just workers have been experiences oppressive treatment from the
government, but also to journalist. Several journalists were beaten, arrested while
covering labor strike. Hiyasmin Saturay, Eric Tandoc, Avon Ang, Psalty Caluza, and Jon
Bonifacio, all reporters with the local AlterMidya Network of independent media outfits,
were detained while reporting on the dispersal of a worker's strike on July 30 against
NutriAsia, a food condiment producer. CNN reported that while filming the strike's
dispersal, Rosemarie Alcaraz, a reporter with the local radio station Radyo Natin
Guimba, was hit in the head with rattan canes and pushed by NutriAsia security guards,
according to local reports. A police officer also hit her Canon 70D camera while she was
filming the melee, the same reports said.

On Job Security

Two conditions underscore the absence of job security in the Philippine work
force. First is the escalating number of unemployed workers who command cheap
wages for limited and small number of employment opportunities. Second is the advent
of automation that displaced and replaced many workers because employers choose
speed and accuracy in production rather than the creative efforts that shall flourish once
labor is relieved from the drudgeries of work.

On Unorganized Labor Force

On Work Discrimination
Discrimination with respect to sex, age, beliefs, and race still exist in the areas of
hiring, promotion, and compensation.
The rate of unemployment of women is higher than of men. Quite a number of
establishments refuse to hire women. Some deprive women of equal opportunities for
career advancement.
 Age consideration is another discriminating factor. Although the Labor Code
defines the legal age brackets for employment, many establishments still prefer
employing workers who are neither too young not too old.
Finally, the issue of racial discrimination has become a disturbing reality for
Filipino overseas workers who are forced to take menial jobs as domestic helpers and
laborers even if their educational attainment and experience prove that they are over-
qualified for the work the take.

Case of Work Discrimination

On Restrictive Laws

The enactment of restrictive laws and legislations pertaining to labor curtails

trade union freedom. Legal restrictions thwart the free and effective exercise of the right
of labor to self-organization, collective bargaining, dispute settlement, and other trade
union activities.
1. Unreasonable requirement for union organization and registration (Article 234,
237, and 238 of the Labor Code);
2. Lofty membership requirements (Article 234 of the Labor Code);
3. Restriction against union membership and union formation among managerial
employees (Article 245 of the Labor Code);
4. Legal sanctions requiring a trade union to acquire the status of an exclusive
collective bargaining unit (Article 257 of the Labor Code);
5. Intervention of government institutions particularly the Bureau of Labor Relations
and the National Labor Relations and the National Labor Relations Commission
in dispute settlement (Article 263 and 265 of the Labor Code);
6. Restrictive provisions against the right to strike that require a fifteen-day notice of
strike, a strike vote of at least two thirds of the collective bargaining unit, strike
ban on vital industries, and government intervention particularly by the President
and the Labor Secretary in the settlement of strike (Batas Pambansa 130, also
known as the New Strike Law);
 7. Free ingress and egress of employers in picket areas and the authority vested
on the President to expand the list of industries protected from strikes (Batas
Pambansa 227, also known as Anti-Scab Law)

Employer’s Resistance and Hostility

Trade unionism poses a threat to employers who cling to their eroding status as
sole owners of capital.
Faced with this perceived danger, employers resort to several underground
measures to quash any step toward unionism among workers. These measures take
the form of job transfer, replacement and discrimination. Some establishments require
non-membership in a union as a condition for employment. Still, there are some
employers who resort to different forms of harassments that include delayed salaries,
pending leave and benefits claims, surveillance, and disciplinary actions on union
members. Fi9nally, there are employers who use sly tactics like forming a company
union and initiating a labor-management council that turns out to be an employer-
dominated assembly.
Because of these intimidations, many attempts to organize a union are frustrated.
Most of the time, employers in the former’s struggle for unionism overpower workers. At
other times workers adopt an indifferent attitude, thus losing a battle that never was

Divisive Trade Rivalry and Competition

Adding a considerable load to the already heavy burden of trade unionism is its
own disunity.
Factionalism bugs the ranks of trade unions. Based on current statistics released
by the Bureau of Labor Relations, there are approximately 1,896 federations and
independent unions throughout the country, all of them caught in a cycle of spins off
splits and breaks caused by personal and organizational rivalries; ideological and
political rifts; national and international alliances and affiliations; strategic separation of
peasant unions from other sector; and exclusion of government employees, security
guards, and managerial employees from the mainstream of the labor movement.
Pseudo Trade Unions

Not all unions promote and protect the interest of labor. There are some that
serve to perpetuate only the selfish interest of certain quarters. Pseudo trade unions are
of five types.
The first type is called the fly-by-night union that disbands as soon as it collects
all union fees from its recruits. A variation of this type exists as a front that assists in
putting a group into political power or in gaining political leverage.
The second type is the corrupt union. It is characterized by rampant graft and
corruption in the form of kickbacks and under-the-table negotiations among union
leaders. The proliferation of this type of union is caused by a number of factors, among
which are the absence of checks and balances within an organization and the lack of
vigilant members.
The third is known as the profit-oriented union that undertakes activities mainly
for the purpose of generating income in the form of dues and fees collected as payment
for such services as research, negotiation, processing and other special union services.
The fourth is called the company-controlled union, which may be directly or
indirectly controlled by the management. A company union that is directly controlled by
management openly operates according to the dictates of the company that organized it
and that provides for all its resources. On the other hand, a company union that is
indirectly controlled by management in exchange for their inclusion in the company’s
“invisible” payroll.
The fifth is the government-controlled union that allows itself to be manipulated
by the government in accordance with the latter’s efforts to reduce political friction and
industrial disorder. Through this type of union, the government is able to realize its
economic and political goals.

Protests and Clamor

Workers demand for living wage, humane working conditions, and ending of
contractualization. However, the response of the state and its forces are violent
dispersals and arrests. Last 2019 National and Local Midterm Elections, Kilos Na!
Manggagawa created a list which they called “Worker’s Agenda.” Included in the
agenda are:
1. End all forms of contractualization. Fight for a decent and regular job;
2. Raise the national minimum wage to 750 pesos every day;
3. Guarantee safe and humane working conditions;
4. Secure worker’s right to housing;
5. Guarantee worker’s right to basic social services;
6. Junk TRAIN LAW and other repressive taxes;
7. No to Jeepney Phase-out;
8. Raise the budget for services; stop mandatory payment for SSS Contribution and
Insurance expenses;
9. Fight for worker’s democratic rights;
10. Fight against sexual harassment in workplace;
11. Fight all forms of graft and corruption;
12. Fight for the national sovereignty.

Filipino workers in Luzon are holding strikes and pickets to fight capitalist exploitation for
super profit.

1. Terminated workers of Jollibee conducted a picket-protest in front of the Jollibee

Worldwide Services-Logistics main commissary and warehouse at West Service
Road, Paranaque City to slam the JFC's circumvention of the DOLE Compliance
Order on Regularization.
2. Pepsi Cola regular and contractual workers held a protest in front their plant in
Tunasan, Muntinlupa on June 14 to fervently reprehend Pepsi Cola Product
Philippines Incorporated (PCPPI) for barring its 1,000 employees from working
since June 11.
3. Forty-four terminated contractual workers of Uni-Pak sardines mounted their
month long "Kampuhan ng mga Kontraktwal" at the Navotas Fish Port Gate.
 4. Early this June, workers in Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction Inc. in
Zambales continue to slam the dismal occupational and safety standards
observed in the shipyard which has resulted in the death of several workers.
5. NutriAsia workers successfully regained their picket after they were violently
dispersed by members of the Philippine National Police on June 14 where at
least 23 were injured and arrested.
6. Last May, 131 long-time contractual workers of Middleby Phils. Corp., a company
located inside Laguna Technopark Industrial Enclave, launched a sitdown strike
against the company’s threat of termination and refusal to regularize them.
7. Honda Parts Mfg. Corp. continue to fire several of its contractual workers despite
the DOLE decision to regularize them. Currently, contractual workers fired from
Honda started their picket line.
8. Workers at Monde Nissin baked goods factory in Santa Rosa in Laguna are on
strike aftr the management refuses to implement DOLE order to regularize
workers and terminated 18.

The number of labor protests that we've been having & always had, all May 1
rallies are constant reminders that the Philippines is one of the worst countries for
workers. For decades we've permitted companies to exploit the Filipino people

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