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In what could be seen as total contrast to the effect of the global economic crisis, the results of the survey conducted by global consultancy and accountancy firm Grant Thornton International states that about 76 percent of privately held businesses (PHB) in Philippines will be expected to increase wages this year and 74 percent indicated they will not retrench workers.

The survey was released through Punongbayan & Araullo (P&A), Grant Thornton’s local partner. The results further states that only 2 percent of PHBs in the country plan to reduce pay, while 12 percent do not expect to implement pay hikes. The survey also said 35 percent expect to increase their number of employees and 49 percent plan to maintain their current number of work force.

P&A CEO and managing partner Greg Navarro rationalizes these results by saying that PHB’s main concern is more on the difficulty of finding the qualified personnel they require, which could explain their reluctance in laying off current employees.

“Local PHBs are in a different boat when it comes to employment issues. Earlier results from the IBR [International Business Report] showed that 63 percent of local PHBs see ‘lack of skilled workers’ as a major constraint to their business expansion. So while we’re hearing about companies around the world not having enough business to keep all their employees, Filipino business leaders have the jobs but have difficulty finding the right workers. It’s a no less worrying situation to be in,” Navarro said.

Before the results of the survey was released, there were debates on the plan of the Board of Investment to use incentives in dissuading companies to layoff employees because of the global crisis. The Makati Business Club however believes that the incentive scheme is just a waste of time, since companies will not retrench workers if they do not need to and that they will still layoff their employees, if it’s really necessary, whether there are incentives or not.