Are You Overworked and Underpaid?

 

If you constantly find yourself pushing beyond your limits, you might be taken advantage of without even being aware of it. Good employees often go above and beyond to maintain productivity and complete their tasks. However, their strong work ethic can make them blind to the warning signs of being underpaid and overworked. Some managers recognise this dedication in workers and assign them the workload of multiple employees without ever offering a raise.

 

Source: https://ms.m.wikipedia.org

 

Here are five indicators that you might be underpaid and overworked:

 

1. An endless to-do list

Your to-do list grows longer each day, and you constantly find yourself having to play catch-up – even working through lunch.

Despite handling an ever-growing workload, you often do not receive compensation for your efforts. Instead, you experience stress and anxiety when you can’t complete everything, failing to realise that no single person should be responsible for such an excessive amount of work.

 

2. An impossibly packed calendar

Good workers are often scheduled for back-to-back meetings, with multiple deadlines stacked on top of each other. A packed calendar might seem like a badge of honour but it’s a sign of being overburdened and underpaid.

 

Even the best employees should not be expected to juggle so much at once. When responsibilities continue to pile up without a salary increase or support from leadership, it’s a clear indication of underpayment.

 

3. Often work beyond office hours

Does a standard 9-to-5 schedule not enough to complete your tasks? Do you find yourself starting early, staying late, and even working on weekends to keep up?

 

Perhaps you consistently check emails while on vacation, never truly disconnecting. Yet, despite working extra hours, you are not paid any extra for your dedication. Working longer and staying late in the office does not necessarily mean you are getting more done.

Studies show that people are truly productive for only about three hours a day, so working longer does not necessarily mean getting more done. Instead, it leads to exhaustion without additional compensation. 

 

4. Extra tasks without extra pay

Underpaid employees are often expected to perform duties beyond their job description. They take on additional work, learn new skills outside their role, and become the go-to person for tasks they were never hired to do.

 

While growth and learning are valuable, doing multiple jobs without an increase in salary is a sign of underpayment. When employees are repeatedly pulled away from their main role to handle unpaid labour, they may start feeling resentful, disengaged and undervalued.

 

5. Receive compliments, not remuneration

Verbal recognition is nice, but it doesn’t pay the bills. Many underpaid employees receive compliments but no financial reward for their efforts.

Being called a “rockstar” in meetings doesn’t change the fact that you are overworked and exhausted. True recognition should come in the form of fair compensation.

 

Know your worth

Employers do not “accidentally” overwork employees – it is often a calculated decision that benefits the company while leaving workers exhausted.

 

If you find yourself constantly facing any of the above, it may be time for a conversation with your manager. Your workload should be adjusted, and your pay should reflect your contributions – or it may be time to find an employer who values your hard work.

 

Reference:

5 signs you’re overworked and underpaid, Anisa Aznan/Jobstore, 19 July 2025

Must We Lower the OPR?

Lowering the overnight policy rate (OPR) to 2.75% is premature. If it is pre-emptive to the many uncertainties in both domestic and overseas markets, then we are being presumptuous. There is no definitive agreement with the US on tariffs, and we need to be wary about inflation. 

In such fluid circumstances, literally anything can occur. For example, the initial tariff of 24% which was suspended for 90 days pending negotiations was arbitrarily increased to 25%. It is arguably more effective if all trade and related factors are known ahead of any change in the OPR. 

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org

The impact of OPR changes affects the stock market, which will face increasing downward pressures as foreign capital exits in search of better returns elsewhere. It is entirely plausible to suggest that Malaysia withholds lowering its OPR to take advantage of other markets that are more attractive to foreign capital searching for a new home. This is not speculative, as shown when RM516.6 million in foreign capital flowed out of Malaysian markets in the week following the rate cut. 

Foreign capital flows have a direct effect on local currencies. Any significant outflows, for example, can put downward pressure, and is exacerbated by the uncertainty of how long such outflows will last. The concern is its subsequent ripple effects, chief among them being making imports more expensive. 

Such a consequence would put undue pressure on the country’s trade surplus, which fell to RM759.9 million in May 2025, a fall of 92.3% compared with a year earlier and 85.2% compared with the month before. 

While there are measures available to defend the ringgit, they are limited and unsustainable. These include, for example, the draining of the country’s international reserves, or repatriating profits on overseas investments. 

On face value, the lower rates should be good news for the lending sector. As it stands, Malaysian household debt is already one of the highest in Asean, coming in at RM1.63 trillion, or 84.2% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). Recent cost-of-living pressures are anticipated to worsen due to the sales and service tax expansion and the rationalisation of petrol subsidies. 

Credit card debt, meanwhile, has increased significantly to RM4.67 billion, an increase of 24.7% from the year before. Buy now, pay later (BNPL) activities are also increasing, reflecting an increasingly stressful situation for Malaysian households. In addition, savers especially those retired ones are directly impacted with this downward change. 

Preliminary GDP data for the second quarter of 2025 from the Statistics Department also puts growth at 4.5% compared with the second quarter of 2024 – a higher figure than the 4.2% forecast by Bloomberg. Inflation seems low (1.2%) but that’s not the justification for OPR reduction. To stimulate the economy? Not likely, with all the uncertainties looming. Reducing cost of doing business? Again, not really – the impact is small for businesses or consumers.

So, what is the real reason to lower the OPR now? 

Reference:

Why the rush to lower the OPR? Mazli Noor, Letter to the Editor, FMT, 18 July 2025

 

 

Wait List for Cardiothoracic Surgery up to 7 Months?

 

Health Minister said patients at government hospitals faced long wait times to undergo procedures such as coronary artery bypass graft or surgery to remove kidney stones.  A total of 2,293 patients are on a waiting list to undergo cardiothoracic surgeries in government hospitals, with some of them facing an average wait time of seven months. 

Meanwhile, there were 603 elective cases of paediatric cardiothoracic surgery, with the patients needing to wait an average of 21 months. This service is available in seven government hospitals that provide cardiothoracic surgeries. Pediatric cardiothoracic surgeries are in the meantime conducted by adult cardiothoracic specialists or referred to the National Heart Institute (IJN) because paediatric cardiothoracic surgeons are still being trained.

 

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org

Another 2,661 patients were waiting to undergo procedures to remove kidney stones, with each one expected to wait 11 months. The procedure is only provided by 13 public hospitals with resident urology surgeons. Another 9,233 patients are waiting to undergo cataract surgeries, with a waiting period of about three months, and 56 government hospitals provide this operation. 

To reduce the wait time for surgical procedures, the Health Ministry had placed more surgical specialists in hospitals without a resident specialist. It is also working to reduce wait times through public-private partnerships. 

For comparison, more than 163,000 people in England are enduring long waits, some of them in such poor health that doctors fear they will have a heart attack, stroke or die prematurely. The figure was 86,540 in February 2022 and 32,186 in February 2020, according to a Guardian analysis.

 

In another study, 52 hospitals in England had waiting times for general surgery procedures increase from 56 to 57 weeks. Waiting lists for most areas of medicine with comparable data have grown since the pandemic, but not by as much as cardiology. General surgery is up 30% since February 2020, ophthalmology is up 38%, neurology 68% and urology 70%. The heart care waiting list is up 75%.

 

Overall, we seem to better than the UK but that is no comfort for those waiting for a procedure. This is not a sudden increase but something we could have foreseen many years ago and got the pipeline activated for specialist doctors. The option of private-public partnership may suggest patients are directed to private hospitals with costs borne by the Ministry. Meanwhile, in Singapore the median waiting time for elective surgery in public hospitals is around 46 days (January 2025). How could they do it? Is it because Malaysian doctors are working hard in Singapore? 

References:

2,293 patients on wait list for cardiothoracic surgery, some up to 7 months, FMT Reports, 22 July 2025 

Number waiting over 18 weeks for NHS heart treatment in England rises fivefold, Andrew Gregory, Pamela Duncan and Pippa Crerar, 11 April 2024

High Income Nation: What Does it Take?

 

The World Bank has declared Kuala Lumpur, Labuan, Penang, Sarawak and Selangor to be high-income states. The bad news, though, is that Malaysia is not there yet. This is the latest high-income data based on Gross National Income (GNI), which is the total amount of factor incomes earned by the residents of a country. The country’s GNI per capita of RM53,400 annually falls short of the high-income threshold of RM63,000. 

Sarawak has joined the high-income state ranks in 2023. It must be doing something right. Three years ago, there were only three states – Penang, KL and Labuan – on the list but Sarawak joined two years ago, and Selangor made the cut last year. A total of five high-income states (including Federal Territories) but the others are below the threshold. 

Malaysia remains in the middle-income trap. We are too rich to compete with low-cost economies like Vietnam and Cambodia, but we are just unable to stand alongside high-income nations like South Korea and Singapore. 

South Korea, once poorer than Malaysia in the 1960s, is now a global tech powerhouse. It achieved this through strategic industrial policy, heavy investment in education and R&D, and a relentless focus on productivity. Singapore, without natural resources, became a financial and innovation hub through clean governance, meritocracy, and human capital development. 

Malaysia now finds itself outpaced by these countries that were once on equal or even lesser footing, and if we are not serious, we could soon be overtaken by Vietnam. 

This is not just about achieving a statistical milestone. It’s about ensuring Malaysians enjoy better jobs, stronger public services, global competitiveness, and the ability to keep our brightest minds at home.

The next five years will be crucial for Malaysia. 

For a start, the government must tackle governance and institutional weaknesses. Policy inconsistency, bureaucratic inefficiency, and rent-seeking behaviour. 

We must increase funding for TVET (technical and vocational education and training), with incentives tied to graduate employability. Among others, we need:

 

·     STEM scholarships and national reskilling initiatives for workers displaced by automation.

·     Tax incentives and matching grants for R&D, automation, and green technologies.

·     Expanded digital infrastructure, particularly in rural areas, to promote inclusive growth.

·     A Malaysian Innovation Fund to support start-ups in Artificial Intelligence, biotech, and climate tech

·     A revamped education system tuned for global needs.

Are our tertiary institutes producing the right kind of graduates who are trained and marketable? Malaysia needs graduates with strong technical skills in in-demand fields like IT, engineering and healthcare. Strong soft skills, adaptability and an entrepreneurial mindset certainly help. It will be even better if they can speak and write in Bahasa Malaysia, English and Mandarin. 

The World Bank high-income threshold is not fixed, and it adjusts its measurement each year.

The bottom three worst performing states are Kedah, Perlis and Kelantan, reflect the politicians in power. We can’t help these states if they prefer politicians who promise a ticket to heaven for voting them in. 

We must act – boldly, intelligently, and urgently for those willing to change – Melaka, Perak, Pahang, Johor and Negeri Sembilan are next best to graduate to high income status. Sabah has potential to do so in the longer term.

 

Reference:

A high target ­– can we meet it? Wong Chun Wai, The Star, 20 July 2025

 

Bumiputera to Make Up Nearly 80% of Malaysians by 2060!

 

Malaysia is projected to undergo a significant demographic shift over the next three decades, with the Bumiputera population expected to make up nearly 80% of the total population by 2060. According to new demographic projections released by the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM), the Bumiputera population is set to rise from 69.4% in 2020 to 79.4% in 2060.

 

The population will continue to grow from 2020 to 2059, the annual growth rate is projected to slow sharply from 1.7% in 2020 to just 0.1% in 2060. In contrast, the proportion of Chinese Malaysians is expected to decline from 23.2% to 14.8%, while the Indian population is projected to shrink from 6.7% to 4.7%.

 

 

The ‘others’ category, meanwhile, is expected to grow modestly, from 0.7% in 2020 to 1.0% by 2060. By gender, the number of men will consistently outnumber women, from a ratio of 1.1 in 2020, to 1.14 in 2060.

 

Malaysia’s total population is projected to peak at 42.38 million in 2059. However, beginning in 2060, the number is expected to decline slightly to 42.37 million, followed by continued decreases to 42.08 million in 2065 and 41.43 million by 2070. Despite the overall slowdown, the populations of Kelantan, Pahang, Perak, Terengganu and Putrajaya are expected to continue rising steadily through 2060.

Selangor is projected to remain Malaysia’s most populous state in 2060, with 8.10 million residents, followed by Johor (4.99 million) and Sabah (4.89 million). According to the National Policy for Older Persons, Malaysia will also be classified as an "ageing nation" by 2036, when 15% of the population is expected to be aged 60 and above. Malaysia’s shift toward an ageing society is also becoming increasingly evident. The proportion of population aged 0 to 14 is projected to decline from 24% in 2020 to 16% in 2060, while the working-age group (aged 15 to 64) is expected to peak at 70.8% in 2030 before falling to 65.7% by 2060.

 

The share of those aged 65 and above is projected to more than double, from 6.8% in 2020 to 18.3% by 2060. Malaysia is expected to become an aged society by 2048, when more than 14% of the population will be aged 65 and above.

 

By 2030, most states are projected to see an increase in their working-age populations, except for Penang, Perlis and Terengganu. Putrajaya is expected to record the highest rise, with its working-age population increasing by 13.6 percentage points to 74.2%, up from 60.6% in 2020.

 

Looking ahead to 2060, Kuala Lumpur is forecast to have the lowest proportion of young people at just 9.1%, while also recording the highest share of elderly residents at 26.2%. By then, Kuala Lumpur, Selangor and Penang are expected to become “super-aged societies”, where more than 20% of the population will be aged 65 and above. All other states — except Kelantan and Terengganu — are projected to reach “aged society” status by 2060.

 

There are several implications arising from the above developments and these include:

·       Care homes and retirement living sector will rise.

·       Healthcare sector will now begin to focus on geriatrics.

·       Property developers will have to re-configure their products.

·       GDP growth will slow down; and

·       Maybe (and just maybe) NEP will no longer be an issue.

 

Reference:

Bumiputera to make up nearly 80% of Malaysians by 2060 as population peaks — DOSM,

Choy Nyen Yiau, theedgemalaysia.com, 11 July 2025

 

What Will Make You More Likeable?

 

There are 8 qualities (at least) that will make you more likeable. Whether you are in a position of leadership or a coworker, it is essential that your colleagues respect you. They may admire your work ethic, knowledge, or ability to seal the transaction. However, respect is more than that. If you can earn their regard as an individual, you will have truly won the game. 

1. Be Courteous

Be courteous to everyone you encounter during the day, from family members to coworkers to the cashier at the supermarket. Extend to others the same courtesy you would expect to receive yourself. That’s the Golden Rule. For example, you can demonstrate courtesy by opening the door for the person behind you or let the individual with one item walk ahead of you in the supermarket store.

 

Source: https://www.wikihow.com

 2. Be Respectful

Eliminate impolite habits such as interrupting and speaking adversely about others. Not only are these actions disrespectful to the individual with whom you are interacting, but they also discourage or impede further involvement or resolution of issues and can create a permanent rift. Instead, cultivate an atmosphere of polite listening. Even if you disagree with someone's beliefs or thoughts, everyone has the right to be heard. Consider how you would like to be treated if you have something to say, particularly if the matter at hand is significant. 

3. Be an Active Listener

Listening is not a passive process but rather an engaged one. Think before speaking. In the majority of contemporary talks, one person's remarks "trigger" the listener, who subsequently shares their own tale along the same lines. Instead of telling your story, you should ask questions that invite the other person to elaborate. Most individuals will be charmed by your concern. 

4. Be Helpful

Respect is earned by constantly being willing to provide a hand or lend an ear anytime help is required or an opportunity presents itself. Consider helping opportunities that you may have ignored in the past. Does a coworker require assistance with a major project? Can you grab someone a cup of coffee? Attempt to be helpful multiple times per day. Remember that the more you give the more you will get. Be kind and give unconditionally. 

5. Stop Making Excuses

Your actions are determined by your decisions, and absent unanticipated circumstances, there is no justification for making excuses. Accept responsibility for your actions. For example, if you're consistently late, don't create stupid excuses. Instead of obsessing over your mistakes, look for opportunities to learn from them and do better next time. Instead of dwelling on your flaws, ask yourself, "How can I improve my conduct or situation?" 

6. Free Your Anger and Yourself

No one is harmed by harbouring hatred or a grudge besides oneself. Permit yourself a moment of anger if you become upset, then move on and either remedy the matter or put it behind you. Allow yourself and others some time off. Forgive, and then forget. 

7. Be Flexible

Being stubborn will get you nowhere. Don't be rigid. Remember that the only constant in life is changes. Recognize that the evolution process involves change. Try to evolve as a person; acquire new abilities, engage in new activities, and reexamine your automatic actions in particular. And don't forget to congratulate yourself on the path to being a better person for whatever improvement you make. 

8. Always Smile

Nobody likes to talk to another person with a sour face. When you smile earnestly, you show your enthusiasm. Putting a smile on your face injects humour into your life. No matter how tough the going is, always smile and be positive. So, smile more often, and you will be more likeable by everyone around you. However, remember that your smiles should be genuine, ok? 

Believe in the process and know that eventually (sooner or later), you will be a better person and more likeable in the office, school, community or at home. Why are you on planet Earth? To add value in the lives of others and to glorify your Creator God! 

Reference:

Qualities That Will Make You More Likeable, Tekkaus, 12 July 2025

Do NTBs Hinder Trade Talks?

 

Minister of Investment, Trade and Industry said non-tariff barriers (NTBs) are a key issue in talks with the US and refuted claims that trade talks between the two countries had collapsed. The higher tariff of 25% has been slapped on Malaysian goods effective from 1 August.

Negotiations focus on three main areas: industrial products, agricultural products, and non-tariff barriers. Progress has been made on industrial and agricultural products, with Malaysia meeting nearly all of US’s requests. However, non-tariff barriers remain a challenge. 

Some key sticking points involve “red lines” tied to Malaysia’s national interests, like halal certification, which affects US beef and poultry exports. Other non-tariff barriers include digital trade and government procurement. 

The ongoing negotiation with the US will mainly address unresolved issues, as well as other matters on industrial and agricultural products, non-tariff barriers, labour and environmental standards, and economic security. 

 

Sector-specific negotiations include semiconductors, electrical and electronics, plastics, aluminium, medical devices, automotive, poultry, dairy and alcohol — most of which are Malaysia’s major export items to the US. 

In April, along with Trump’s tariff move, the US Trade Representative released a 2025 report listing trade barriers faced by US exporters. These include tariffs and non-tariff issues on alcohol, poultry, beef, government buying preferences, intellectual property, internet rules, and local equity rules (Bumiputera requirements). 

The problem with the US trade talks is credibility. What assurance is there that the US will honour an agreement? An example is the USA-Mexico-Canada Agreement (“USMCA”) on trade between these countries, which was effectively abandoned by Trump. It was the same on the nuclear arms deal with Iran or the Climate Change Agreement which were all abandoned by the US. If you are dealing with an unstable leader, be prepared for surprises! 

Reference:

Non-tariff barriers hinder US-Malaysia trade talks, Izzul Ikram, Luqman Amin & Maryam Kamal, theedgemalaysia.com, 10 Jul 2025