As part of the government’s enhancements to the Workfare Income Scheme, salaries for lower-wage workers will be adjusted, DPM Wong announced in his Budget speech today (Feb 16). Adjustments will be made to workfare and progressive wages to reduce wage disparity and ensure that lower-wage workers continue to be uplifted.
Lower-wage senior workers will qualify for a maximum annual payout of S$4,900, up from S$4,200 today. The increment will depend on their age and wage, and older workers and persons with disabilities will receive the highest payments.
The government will also raise the qualifying income cap from S$2,500 to S$3,000 for the Workfare Income Scheme to ensure that lower-wage workers will continue to receive benefits as their wages grow.
The enhancements to the scheme will benefit around half a million Singaporeans starting from Jan 1, 2025.
To provide for these enhancement, the fund for the Workfare Income Scheme will be topped up by S$1 billion.
Additionally, the Local Qualifying Salary (LQS) for full-time workers will be raised from S$1,400 to S$1,600 from July 1 this year, and the minimum hourly rate will also be increased from S$9 to S$10.50 per hour.
The LQS is the minimum salary that firms hiring foreign workers are required to pay their local workers, and the number of local workers paid the LQS is then used to compute the firm’s foreign worker quota entitlement.
Employers who raise the wages of lower-wage workers will also get more support from the government through the Progressive Wage Credit Scheme, where the government co-funds the wage increases of lower-wage workers with employers.
The government will be increasing the co-funding levels will be raised for 2024 to a maximum of 50 per cent, up from a maximum of 30 per cent.
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