Middle Eastern Finance and Economics ISSN: 1450-2889 Issue 3 (2009) EuroJournals Publishing, Inc. 2009 http://www.eurojournals.com/MEFE.

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Manpower Utilization, Labour Standards and Labour Cost the Ranking of Manpower Competition for Muslims Countries in ASEAN
Yu-Cheng Lai Department of Finance, Shih Chien University Kaohsiung Campus No. 200 University Rd, Neimen Shiang, Kaohsiung 845, Taiwan E-mail: br00846@yahoo.com Tel: + 88673326801; Fax: + 88675371841 Chia-hui Hsieh Department of Finance, Shih Chien University Kaohsiung Campus No. 200 University Rd, Neimen Shiang, Kaohsiung 845, Taiwan 372 Minchuing Secod Road, Kaohsiung 806, Taiwan E-mail: chh.h689@msa.hinet.net Abstract This research will investigate the manpower competition in ASEAN, and ranking their competition for Muslims countries in ASEAN. In particular, we find that Indonesia have higher manpower competition than other nations in ASEAN. Compare to Laos and Thailand, the advantage of manpower competition for Indonesia mainly comes from the labour-capital relationship. It may show that this Muslims country have a stabilize labourcapital relationship, leading to the comparative advantage for business investment. Keywords: Labour quality, National Competitions, ASEAN JEL Classification Codes: J53; J58.

1. Introduction
With regard to the geographic location, Southeast Asia is not such close to Middle East. However, Southeast Asia is always considered the Islamic fringe, Islam found in Southeast Asia facilitated the development of democracy and industrialization. In ASEAN, the population for Muslims is approximately two hundred million. As seen in table 1, Indonesia has the highest Muslim percentage, then are Brunei and Malaysia. The research will investigate the manpower competition for Muslims countries in ASEAN. However, Islamization of Southeast Asia has rapid economic growth. Indonesia, Brunei and Malaysia, are modern, industrial, and urban while still being a devout Muslim. In particular, we will see the ranking for manpower competition among the Muslim countries. In particular, we find that Indonesia have higher manpower competition in ASEAN, their advantage of manpower competition mainly comes from the labour-capital relationship. However, the economic growth from the 1970s in Indonesia, the rapid pace of industrialization, urbanization, leading to destabilizing, and people often turn to religion to make sense of their changed lives. The religion of Muslim should play an important role to stabilize the relationship between employers and employees.

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There are seven sections in this paper. The second section will discuss the national competition for labour, using the theory of scholars to talk the idea of manpower competition. The third section mentions more detail and definition for each index. The fourth section will talk about the data we collect, the time, the background of observations. The fifth section will discuss the methodology, how to calculate the index for each variable as well as the aggregated index for each states in ASEAS. The sixth section will discuss the results for national manpower competition. The last section will conclude all these results.
Table 1: The Muslims percentage in 2008
The Percentage Ranking 1 2 3 4 5 6 6 7 8 8

Country Name Muslims Percentage Indonesia 88% Brunei 67% Malaysia 59% Singapore 16% Myanmar 15% Thailand 10% Philippines 10% Cambodia 7% Vietnam 1% Laos 1% Source: http://www.islamicpopulation.com/asia/asia_islam.html#top

2. National Manpower Competition

Dryers and Reeves (1995) claims that the organizational effectiveness. First, human resource outcomes such absenteeism, turnover and individual or group performance; Second, organizational outcomes such as productivity, quality and service; and third, financial or accounting outcomes such as return on invested capital or return on assets. For the human resources outcomes, Bird and Bleechler (1995) believe that the factors affect human resources including business ethic, average length of tenure, promotion of employees, and turnover of employees. Under the Council of Economic Planning and Development request (CEPD, 1995), BERI (Business Environment Risk Intelligence) measures Taiwans industry by QWI (Quality of workforce Index). By using fixed weight, there are three dimensions, including the workforce performance, working characteristics and workforce organization and practice. Based on the BERI standards for human resources of quality, San et. al. (1997) claims, there are seven dimensions affecting the index of human resources in Taiwan. It includes labour productivity, training, education, labour-capital relationship, the labour structure change, labour safety and health, worker living quality. Under the survey of Taiwanese businessman who invests in ASEAN, there are five dimensions affecting human resources (Tseng et. al, 2002), including labour quantity, labour cost, the labour quality, labour-capital relationship, and culture in the society. Based on above studies, we can conclude the dimensions affecting the manpower competition in table 1, including the labour quantity (labor supply, labour productivity), labour quality (education, training), labour cost, labour disputes or industrial disputes and union power (labour-capital relationship, culture in the society, labour safety and health, labour structure change, working living quality). To the weight of each nation, Tseng et. al (2002) know that Singapore and Malaysia, the questionnaire answers pay more attention to the labour quality. In Thailand, Philippine and Indonesia, the questionnaire answers place more emphasis on the labour-capital relationships. In Vietnam, questionnaire answers will more focus on the labour cost. Finally, the aggregated index for manpower, Tseng et. al. (2002) claims that Taiwanese businessman prefers the manpower quality Singapore first, then Vietnam, Malaysia, Philippine, Thailand, the last is Indonesia.

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Table 2:
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Dimensions of Manpower Competition
BERI (1995) (1)Workforce Performance (2)Workforce Characteristics (3)Workforce Organization & Practice San et. al. (1997) (1) Labour Productivity (2a) Education Training (3a) Labour-capital Relationship Tseng et. al. (2002) (1) Labour Supply (2a) Labour Quality (2b) Labour cost (3a) Labour-capital Relationship (3b)Culture in the Society

Dimens ion

(3c) Labour Safety and Health (3d) Labour Structure Change (3e) Workers Living Quality Sources: CEPD(1995),San et. al, (1997) and Tseng et. al. (2002) Note: In San et. al. (1997) paper, the dimension of education and training should belong to labor quality in other papers. For the (3c) Labor Safety and Health, (3d) Labor structure change, (3e) Workers living quality do not belong to the (3b) culture in the society in other papers, therefore, we rearrange the number 3c, 3d,3e.

3. Theoretical Expectation
Based on discusses in section 2, there are some factors will affect the manpower competition. With regard to the labour cost, it has two dimensions for costs of wages and employee benefits, and turnover costs. At the same time, we also combine the labour quantity and quality to the single dimension of manpower utilization. Therefore, there are four dimensions to measure the national manpower competition, including manpower utilization, costs of wages and employee benefit, turnover costs, labour disputes or industrial disputes and manpower utilization. 3.1. Manpower Utilization Manpower utilization includes two sub-categories, including both quantity and quality for manpower. Higher labour quantity and quality will represent higher competition for national economy. The higher labour quantity can have higher productivity, including both labour force participation and weekly working hours (Arthur, 1994; Dyer and Reeves, 1995).1 Labour quality is calculated by enrollment ratios or literacy rates, however, enrollment ratios represent investment levels in human capital, and literacy is a stock variable2 (Hanushek and Zhang, 2006; Benhabib and Spiegel, 1994). Not only the enrollment rate, have we also considered the pupil teacher ratio for each education level (Black and Smith, 2006). The indexes of labour quality (primary, secondary and tertiary education) are calculated from their enrollment ratio divided by pupil teacher rate. Since the higher enrollment ratio can indicate the higher education quality (Marginson, 2006). In contrast to enrollment ratio, the lower pupil teacher ratio can have higher education quality (Black and Smith, 2006). 3.2. Costs of Wages and Employee Benefit The higher labour cost will damage the national competition of manpower. In particular, most industries in ASEAN are labour-intensive which high labour cost will decline competitiveness of traditional export industries (Ghani et. al., 2008). Therefore, the costs of wages and employee benefits are the negative index for national competition. Costs of wages and employee benefit will include the average hourly wage rates, real wage inflation rates and the benefit level. This dimension includes costs of wage and fringe benefit, higher these labour cost will decline national competitions. The wage cost mainly indicates average hourly
1 2

Arthur (1994) and Dyer and Reeves (1995) believe that the number working hours can represent the labor productivity. Tallman and Wang (1994) claims that the increased productivity of additional education by weighting the educational levels assuming that more educated workers are more productive. Specifically, we attach weights of 1 to workers completing only a primary education, 1 to those completing secondary education, and 1 for those completing higher education in the first index measure of human capital. This weighting scheme is typical in the literature of the economics of growth and education (Maddison, 1987; Pencavel, 1991)

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wage and the wage inflation. The wage inflation represents the labour cost stabilization. The stabilization of labour cost will affect the competition of manpower, and the higher wage inflation will have lower manpower competition. 3 The fringe benefits are other cost for non-wage cost, and it will decline national competitions. Since it cannot direct measure from hard data, we will measure it from the soft data. The higher level of the fringe benefits implies higher labour standards and labour cost. 3.3. Turnover Costs Turnover costs includes recruitment, training and severance costs; Higher recruitment costs imply that employers have some difficulties to find the employees. After hiring new employees, employers need to pay training cost for the new hiring employees. The higher training cost implies that employees need more training after schooling. It implies that the lower labour quality (Castle and Engberg, 2005). However, higher turnover cost will decline employers willingness to hire full-time workers (Jiang et. al. , 2009). It will be a negative index for national competition.4 Higher severance payment may represent higher labour cost as well as job security. Higher job security implies employment rigidity (Lai and Masters, 2005; Lai, 2004). The higher turnover costs will represent higher labour standards, and it will decline manpower competition. 3.4. Labour or industrial disputes and union power Labour or industrial disputes include number of strikes and lockouts, working days lost, the enforcement degree of labour legislation, the coverage degree of labour legislation. Higher frequency of labour disputes will create the problem of investment (Krueger and Mas, 2004). With regard to labour protection, the higher coverage of labour legislation will create the problems of employment rigidity (Lai and Masters, 2005). It will block out the business investment, because higher labour standards will hinder economic development (Marshall, 2005; Besley and Burgess, 2002) . Union power will include the union effect on wage rates and the labour existing power on foreign companies. Higher union power will increase negotiation power between employers and employees. It may block out the interests for investment (Hirsch, 2008). Therefore, the higher level for labour or industrial disputes and union power will decline national manpower competition.5

4. Data
The main purpose of this paper is to establish a general manpower competition index. The index consists of four major categories, namely, manpower utilization, cost of wages and employee benefit, turnover, and labour or industrial disputes and union power. In compiling the index, we have collected scholars in most famous university in those countries. Based on soft and hard data in ASEAN, the survey will include the index and weight for each factor. The data collect from government officers, businessman (employers and employees) and academy workers. 6 Each nation will collect 50 samples. The hard data we collect from 1999, 2000,
3

4 5

Based on the based year 1990, we calculate average hourly wage by GNI per capital (Gross National Income) divided by average working hours for a year Since we have difficult to find the average wage for all ten states. We use the national income (Gross National Income) as the average wage for all sectors The recruitment cost and training cost are equal to hiring cost, but the severance payment is the firing cost. Arthur (1994) claims that managements attempt to implement a classic control system for reducing labour costs by unilaterally increasing performance standards and maintaining wages and benefits is likely to be met by strong resistance from a unionized work force. Academy Workers include Department of Economics, Department of Public Finance, Department of Business Administration, Department of Business Policy, Department of Labour Relationship, Department of Human Resource Management, Department of Public Administration, and Department of Politic. Government Officers include Officers for Department of International Trading, Officers for Department of Human Resources, Officers for Department of National

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and 2001 three years, and soft data are based from 2000. 7 The figure 1 list those variables used to calculate the index of manpower competition. The means and standards deviation for soft data are based on the Singapore. The soft data of the nation other than Singapore are based on Singapore. Since the survey of those nations soft data are compared to Singapore. 8 The Singapore data is based on view of others nations in ASEAN, and there is a nine-nation view for Singapores soft data.
Figure 1: The Index Item for Human Resource
Labour force participation rate, LFPR (Positive Index) Weekly working hours (Positive Index) Literacy ratio (Positive Index)

Manpower Utilization

Elementary Education Index (Positive Index) Secondary Education Index (Positive Index) Tertiary Education Index (Positive Index)

Average wage rates (Negative Index)

Costs of Wages and Employee Benefit

Average wage inflation (Negative Index)

The benefit level of employee (Negative Index)

Turnover Costs

The level of recruitment cost (Negative Index) The level of training cost (Negative Index) The level of severance payment (Negative Ind.) Number of strikes and lockout (Negative Index) Working days lost (Negative Index) The enforcement degree of labour legislation (Negative Index) The coverage degree of labour legislation (Negative Index) The union effect on wage rates (Negative Index) The labour existing power on foreign companies (Negative Index)

Labour Disputes or Industrial Disputes and Union Power

Note: is hard data is soft data

7 8

Accountancy, Officers for Department of Labour Relationships, Officers for Department of National Statistics Taiwanese, and Officers in those States Business: Managers in Taiwanese Business, Human Resources, Managers in Domestics Business Human Resources, Managers in International Business Taiwanese Bankers in those states, International and Domestics Bankers, and Representatives of Labour Union. In order to measure the index for both soft and hard data, we calculate the hard data for the average index for 1999, 2000 and 2001,because the soft data only have 2000 data. On the right-hand side of each statement, please kindly check in the appropriate box ranking from the lowest (1) to the highest (7) for (Country I) and (Country II) according to the best of your knowledge about their human resource.

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5. Methodology
With regard to the index of each factor, there are four dimensions for manpower competitions; it includes manpower utilization, costs of wages and employee benefit, turnover costs, labour disputes or industrial disputes and manpower utilization. With regard to the weight of each index, we calculate those weights of index under government officers, business and scholars of each nation. We collect data from each nation in ASEAN, and calculate the means of weight for each index in every nation. We use below measure the index of each factor.

s s i 100 I i = 50 i 6 Where I i is Index for each variable si is the index for each factor?
si is the means for each factor

(1)

is the standards deviation for each factor

Based on this measurement, the index locates at 50 for center, and there are three standards deviations for either the index up 50 or below 50. Thus, we use the index for calculation from 0 to 100. It will be the positive index if the measurement uses 50 plus standards deviation. In the other hand, the negative index will use 50 minus standards deviations. The index will be the positive index if those variables can help competition of national economy. In contrast to the positive index, it will be the negative index if those variables discard with the manpower competition.

AI = Wi I i
i =1

(2)

Where AI is aggregated index Wi is weight for each index The index of manpower competition will be calculated from the weight with their means in each dimensions factor. The index is then established by the following five major steps: (1) selection of the appropriate relevant statistics for each category (2) data collection, (3) conversion of all the relevant statistics into index, (4) determination of appropriate weight for each category and (5) calculate the weight sum to obtain the aggregated index. Under the method of indexation, we measure the competition for human resources. We try to find the rank for national competition in these ten states, providing the information of business investment.

6. Results
There are three parts in this section. We conclude the results of weight in first section, then aggregate index in next section, it also explain whats difference in the result of Singapore. Finally, the last section will describe the results for each dimension.
6.1. Weight

Table 3 shows that the weight for each dimension and the calculation of weight will depend on survey for each nation. We find that the cost of wages and employee benefits are the higher weight for both Laos and Thailand. But the manpower utilization is the highest weight for other eight nations. We know questionnaire answers in most nations will focus on the manpower utilization, but both Laos and Thailand will more focus on the cost of wages and employee benefits. Most nations believe that their enriched labour quantity and quality will benefit their national competition. On the other hand, the

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other two states questionnaire answers will believe that their manpower competition mainly come from lower wages.
Table 3:
Dimension Manpower Utilization Costs of Wages and Employee Benefit Turnover Costs Labour Disputes or Industrial Disputes and Union Power

The Weight of Each Dimension

Indonesia 30.594 20.893 25.797 22.702 Brunei 30.448 26.929 23.580 18.929 Malaysia 28.970 25.769 23.862 21.392 Singapore 31.632 29.656 18.879 19.822 Myanmar 50.000 25.000 15.000 10.000 Thailand 27.748 29.727 21.888 20.635 Philippine 27.816 26.073 22.692 23.408 Cambodia 29.498 25.180 22.800 22.518 Vietnam 36.168 28.649 15.258 19.908 Laos 27.109 34.153 24.645 14.090

Source: Our Survey collect from government officers, employers and employees and academy workers.

6.2. Results of Aggregated Index

With regard to the aggregated index, Laos and Thailand have higher index than other states. Since the aggregated index for general level of human resources, both Laos and Thailand have comparative advantages for cost of wage and employee benefits. Cambodia and Singapore are evaluated for lower number of aggregated index, which needs general or unskilled manpower. There are two reasons. First one is the weight definition, the value of weight are defined by each nations. Since the weight is based on questionnaire answers in each nation. Second, the index is based on the general labour. For Singapore, it has a higher quality for skilled labour, but lacking of sufficient general labour.9
Table 4:
Dimension Manpower Utilization Costs of Wages and Employee Benefit Turnover Costs Labour Disputes or Industrial Disputes and Union Power Aggregate d Index

The Aggregated Index

Indonesia 15.305 (7) 11.546 (8) 14.797 (1) 13.129 (1) 54.772 (3) Brunei 17.724 (3) 10.735 (9) 12.587 (5) 10.625 (7) 51.67 (6)0 Malaysia Singapore Myanmar Thailand Philippine Cambodia Vietnam 15.474 (6) 13.308 (4) 12.665 (4) 11.498 (5) 52.943) (4) 18.312 (2) 9.706 (10) 8.104 (9) 11.743 (4) 47.863 (9) 21.974 (1) 14.756 (3) 7.781 (10) 5.083 (10) 49.595 (8) 17.375 (4) 15.404 (2) 11.539 (7) 11.018 (6) 55.336 (2) 12.566 (8) 14.360 (6) 12.507 (6) 11.797 (3) 51.227 (7) 11.685 (10) 13.439 (7) 12.806 (3) 9.742 (8) 47.673 (10) 15.738 (5) 14.372 (5) 9.173 (8) 12.401 (2) 51.683 (5) Laos 12.362 (9) 22.740 (1) 13.979 (2) 7.911 (9) 56.993 (1)

Note: Inside the parentheses is the rank Source: The table 4 is calculated from Equation (2) and table 5.

6.3. Results of Dimension

The manpower utilization as seen in table 5 shows that Myanmar and Singapore have higher index, which have better labour quality and quantity, but Laos and Cambodia have lower rank. As seen in the table 5, Thailand has the higher labour quantity than other nations, including both labour force
9

The other reason may come from the soft data are based on Singapore; questionnaire answers in other nation have bias for the soft data.

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participation and working hours. With regard to the labour quality, Thailand has the highest index for literacy, but Brunei has the higher index for all three-education measurement (Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary). Laos and Thailand have higher index for wages and employee benefits, but Singapore and Brunei have lower rank for those cost. As seen in the table 5, Myanmar has the highest index for average working hours and benefits, Laos have the highest index for average wage inflation. 10 With regard to the turnover costs, Indonesia and Laos have higher index than other nations, those countries have low turnover costs. On the other hand, Myanmar and Singapore have lower index than other states in turnover costs. As seen in the table 5, Vietnam has the highest index for recruitment cost, training cost and severance payment. With regard to the labour disputes or industrial disputes and union power, Indonesia and Vietnam have higher index than other states in the labour disputes or industrial disputes as well as union power. On the other hand, Laos and Myanmar have lower index than other states in the labour disputes or industrial disputes and union power. As seen in the table 5, Singapore has the highest index in union effect in ASEAN. Brunei, Singapore, Laos and Vietnam have the highest index for the strikes and lockout. Vietnam has the lowest degree for labour legislation enforcement and coverage. At the same time, Cambodia has the highest index for the labour existing power on foreign company.
Table 5:
Factor Labour Force Participation Rate Working Hours Literacy Primary Education Index Secondary Education Index Tertiary Education Index Average Hourly Wage Average Wage Inflation Benefit Recruitment Cost Training Cost Severance Payment Union Effect Strikes Working Days Lost Labour Legislation Enforcement Labour Legislation Coverage Labour Existing Power on Foreign Power 45.761 45.321 51.492 61.476 55.270 49.751 58.400 53.275 54.674 54.490 58.412 59.162 59.423 60.441 56.164 59.058 58.208 35.812 48.752 58.506 85.164 84.495 68.362 13.505 41.507 52.220 53.282 54.092 52.772 57.976 60.441 56.164 55.184 55.054 34.426 67.810 52.389 60.071 56.849 53.509 53.935 46.069 53.285 53.735 53.618 51.866 50.911 53.760 56.017 53.994 53.531 38.999 62.982 59.916 47.273 66.064 85.872 24.294 38.265 34.182 37.027 49.851 41.889 82.297 60.441 56.164 43.387 43.259 63.497 36.173 48.246 34.693 32.701 36.602 59.213 57.241 59.821 51.278 52.482 51.868 48.243 52.615 56.072 48.916 49.791 71.770 69.729 64.834 55.063 52.320 45.762 56.245 44.746 53.146 57.021 45.136 56.004 55.023 52.042 53.728 54.698 53.370 37.474 44.051 64.019 39.068 41.137 54.092 57.573 48.449 57.134 54.288 56.417 54.627 53.396 26.462 50.507 53.144 53.896 34.287 67.810 22.618 25.313 30.280 34.490 59.138 39.865 57.245 55.974 57.122 55.415 49.652 12.909 2.853 54.559 56.135 60.726 20.050 60.311 45.198 43.790 37.250 58.700 36.905 52.529 60.218 60.238 59.882 64.760 60.441 56.164 61.784 61.191 77.243 37.317 17.664 46.676 37.089 34.304 58.992 93.673 56.840 56.632 58.338 55.196 55.929 60.441 56.164 55.095 55.460

The Index for Each Factor

Indonesia Brunei Malaysia Singapore Myanmar Thailand Philippine Cambodia Vietnam Laos

56.189

55.085

53.922

68.106

50.886

52.576

54.227

52.646

64.947

55.694

Source: The table 5 is calculated from Equation (1).

10

Comparatively Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia have cheaper labour compare to other ASEAN countries (Ghani et. al. , 2008).

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7. Conclusion
With regard to the aggregated index, we find that the Laos, Thailand and Indonesia have higher index. In particular, the Indonesia has the highest Muslims percentage in ASEAN, their manpower competition mainly comes from lower turnover costs and labour or industrial disputes and union power. It may show that this Muslims country has a stabilize labour-capital relationship, leading to the comparative advantages for business investment. On the other hand, the labour-capital relationship in Brunei and Malaysia do not perform well. With regard to Malaysia, their ranking is lower than Indonesia, but their manpower competition in each factor performs equally. With regard to Brunei, their manpower competition is lower than Indonesia and Malaysia. Their index for manpower utilization is high, but their index among costs of wages and benefits is low. With regard to Singapore, they have relatively higher wages than other nations in ASEAN. Therefore, Singapore has a lower manpower competition; On the other hand, the manpower utility of Myanmar has better ranking than other nations, but their situation of turnover costs and labour or industrial disputes and union power are the lowest rank in these ten nations.

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