Umemployment O_o

There was a short meeting yesterday afternoon where the CSO (Chief Scientific Officer) delivered a very bad news. 22 people out of the 93 employees here in the company will lose their jobs. That's like 24 percent! That's the result of the merger earlier this year, lack of funds, revenues, blah blah blah... Everyone looked ashen as they left the room. I felt like I was looking from outside a window in. Because I am not affected by this (since I am not technically an employee of this company, am free labour for them bascially). Even then, as I looked at the colleagues who have been so nice to me, I felt really sad. The CSO left promptly after his announcement (more like trying to escape a scene of disaster asap, i think) and there were further announcements about the postitions that will be removed.

There are 2 posts in the laboratory (the DMPK department) above our laboratory that will be removed. 2 very nice ladies who are in those 2 positions. Sighz... My first time feeling a 'retrenchment' (or 'economic licensing' is what they say in French I think) hit so close to home.

That's why some people say it's risker to work in a private company, I guess. I believe in Singapore, they tend to retrench the people in higher positions and who are much older first right? Here, because of the strong presence of the Union and their more pro-employee society, the company tends to choose the younger employees who are single (not married, no kids) to retrench first. Cos' then they wouldn't have to pay more to retrench the employee. I think this is quite a good system to protect the employees, especially the older ones, since it is more difficult for them to find a new job once retrenched. However, it bodes bad news for the younger, singles. (a girl-friend/colleague here seem to be one of the 'victims')

Another thing I found out about their pro-employee/people system is that unemployed people (French citizens or those with the proper work visas) are able to get a considerable sum of money (80% of their last net salary) each month from the government (s'appel chomage en francais) for a period of up to 18 months (if I didn't remember wrongly) while they are 'looking for a new job'. When I first heard that from my colleague about this, I was like 'Wow'! That's pretty cool! Imagine sitting at home (whether or not you are fervently looking for a new job) and getting $$$! But then again, the French pay a considerable amount of their salary towards taxes (a hefty 25%!!!) which includes the chomage. (I apologise for not using the correct accents- the o should be accented- in the French words I write cos' I don't think I can write alphabets with accents in blogger)

A very bad thing about this chomage system is that you then get quite a lot of people sitting around doing nothing and receiving $ from the government. I believe this is the case in a lot of other countries such as Australia. I know one lady personally, who told me she refuses to work for less than a certain amount of $, and just sit around at home waiting for that Dream job to drop into her lap (i.e. she does nothing to search for a job, no looking at newspapers or stuff like that whatsoever). And how she could do this while still paying her rent, buy food, nice clothes is cos' she gets paid through chomage. Her previous job was waitressing where she was paid well for very short working hours (cool job eh? Too bad not everyone of us can get something like that. She's pretty, I tell you!). Cos' of, ehmm, special relations to the owner of the restaurant. And she is expecting to find another job like that. I was talking to her one day and she mentioned to me that one of her girl-friends is looking for some girls to work in a boutique, so I asked her, hey why don't you try that one out? She told me that the salary for that job is the same as what she gets now through chomage and the working hours are quite long, so why should she take that job when she could stay at home and do nothing and still get paid? I had nothing to say. It sounds reasonable, but to me also very dumb. I am not one who can sit around at home doing nothing for long periods of time. Even if I were not to work, I think I would try to do some stuff with myself rather than stay cooped up at home all day and then complain that life sucks, I'm depressed and stuff like that (yes, she does that, if that's what you are thinking). Once, cos' she takes some very strong medicine for her migraines and depression that knocks her out for almost a day after, she missed an interview for a waitressing job at a good restaurant. O_o

Eh, I think I've digressed quite a bit. Leave you guys to ponder about the big differences in the European/American/Australian/New Zealand system verus ours... I've spotted quite a lot. And as always, both have their good and bad.

Have a great weekend! A lundi!