Devon Dick
IN THE Sunday Gleaner, a young doctor working at the KPH asserted that he will be leaving Jamaica because of low salary, lack of medical supplies and poor working conditions. He bemoaned earning $62,000 a month and working for 100 hours per week.
There are persons who claim that Jamaicans must be more productive in order to get a better wage. Here is a professional working 100 hours a week in an important job and cannot make two ends meet. Neither can he deliver quality health care because of circumstances and conditions over which he has no control.
But columnist Aubyn Hill stated that the average salary for senior bankers and senior lawyers was $13.5 million a year. Is it that lawyers and bankers are more important and productive that junior doctors?
Doctors and nurses have perhaps the highest migratory rate in Jamaica. And what is being done to retain them? Other professionals have a similar story. The members of the police force are underpaid, work long hours and many stations are dilapidated and the mantra of the leadership is 'inadequate resources'.
Even Deputy Commissioner Mark Shields had to lament the lack of simple basic material. Based on the workload of the police they should be well paid.
The most urgent job is to have a commissioner who can deal decisively with the murder rate. Therefore, based on the urgency and importance of the work and the long hours, he or she should not be getting less than $13 million a year!
Security is a major problem in this land so one would expect that security guards who work in a high-risk job for long hours should be highly-paid.
But their minimum wage is about $3,500 a week!
MEDIA WORKERS
In First World countries media workers and actors would attract a high salary, but not so in Jamaica. These workers have a high profile but low wages and it has little to do with productivity. It has more to do with government policy and the owners of capital. They, and not market forces, determine salary. They, and not the importance or the urgency of the occupation determine the salary. It has less to do with ability to pay and more with other factors. Many hotel workers who help to earn foreign currency are also at the low end of salaries, including being paid minimum wage. The Government knows about it and an opposition MP agrees that it has to be low in order to compete with the Dominican Republic.
If you do not believe that it is government policy and the captains of industry who determine salary more than all other factors, then look at the housing market. The NHT is awash with cash. It could easily increase the benefits and decrease the interest rate. However, if the Government does that then the profit margins of building societies and banks would be affected. The financial institutions would be forced to offer more attractive rates.
These activities are courting disaster. The immediate past president of the World Bank spoke about foolish rich people. They want the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer; not realising that their wealth is dependent on the ability of the poor to have a reasonable purchasing power.
The PM speaking at the U.N. spoke eloquently when he said security of the rich nations is compromised when there is an oasis of wealth in a desert of poverty. This also applies to Jamaica.
It is high folly for petroleum companies to maintain their margins in this high oil bill climate. It is stupidity for JPS to increase bills immediately while they will give rebates for overcharging next year.
The young doctor spoke about stealing medical supplies so that he can function and save lives. Who is more righteous - the one who steals drugs to help needy patients or the one who withholds the drugs from needy patients? That is what some persons are doing to survive. Hustle, steal, sell drugs and self. And is the young doctor leaving because he also feels insecure knowing what will happen after speaking out?
We are courting disaster if we maintain, conveniently, this salary/ productivity fallacy.
Rev Devon Dick is pastor of Boulevard Baptist Church and author of 'Rebellion to Riot: the Church in Nation Building'.
