Sociedade de Jogos de Macau, the casino operating company founded by Stanley Ho, says all its Macau employees will get a pay rise of between 5% and 10% in the new year. The company didn’t say what the wage increase means in cash terms. SJM’s net profit in 2010 was US$456.6 million, according to a filing with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange.
The precise number of people entitled to receive the payments is also unclear. Twenty casinos in Macau operate under an SJM gaming licence but only four—The Lisboa, Grand Lisboa, Jai Alai and Oceanus—are directly managed by the company with 100% SJM staff. The remainder are run by third parties but with varying degrees of involvement by SJM management and staff. The total number employed in SJM-licensed casinos in Macau is thought to be around 13,000 people.
SJM also announced today that employees will receive a bonus for 2011. Those on the lowest pay scales—MOP10,000 (US$1,247) per month or below—will be entitled to receive 150% of their normal monthly salary, added the company. Next year’s salary increases will also be weighted so that those on the lowest levels will receive the biggest percentage increase within the 5% to 10% increase on offer.
The company’s announcement follows signs of labour unrest at SJM in recent months, with unions publicly calling on the SJM management to improve pay. Traditionally SJM has been known for offering lower basic salaries than the other Macau operators, but generally better perks and working conditions. Dr Ho has in the past personally awarded five- or even six-figure sums to long-standing employees in lieu of pension when they retire. But in the increasingly corporatised Macau labour market, and with SJM now part publicly held with outside shareholders to answer to, such paternalistic practices appear to be on the wane. In addition, a rising cost of living alongside the rising standard of living means many younger employees may not have the patience to eat bread today on the promise of jam tomorrow.
In November Macau’s Chief Executive, Fernando Chui Sai On, urged employers to raise employee wages to allow them to catch up with Macau’s economic development. Elements of Dr Ho’s paternalism persist however at the heart of Macau’s social policy. Mr Chui also announced during his annual policy address last month, that permanent and non-permanent residents will receive a cash handout of MOP11,200 next year. When other extended benefits for the elderly and other special interest groups are included, it will take the government’s spending on welfare payments to MOP8.56 billlion (US$1.07 billion) during 2012, according to figures discussed in the territory’s Legislative Assembly. The population of Macau in the third quarter of 2011 was 560,100 according to data from the Statistics and Census Service, and 91,241 of these were non-resident workers—mostly without the right to any future residency. That suggests the government will subsidise every Macau inhabitant with residency rights—around 469,000 people, many of them non-taxpayers—to the tune of around MOP18,250 per head during 2012.
But Susana Chou, a former Macau lawmaker who was president of the Legislative Assembly from the time of Macau’s handover by Portugal in 1999, until she retired in 2009, suggests that government subsidy for the inhabitants is no substitute for coherent policy on social development. On her personal blog she stated last week: “[There are problems] Especially with the legal lag [law infrastructure], ever-expanding civil service, judicial and administrative mismanagement, poor performance issues, accountability issues, Macau’s economic structure, and the [threat to] Macau SMEs’ survival.”
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