KUALA LUMPUR (Oct 30): Employers are upbeat about the outlook for the employment market next year based on targeted initiatives of Budget 2022, the largest budget to date that indicates the government is putting in place measures to help accelerate the country's economic recovery, according to the Malaysian Employers Federation (MEF).

In particular, the MEF views positively the government's allocation of RM4.8 billion to create 600,000 jobs under the JaminKerja initiative, said MEF president Datuk Dr Syed Hussain Syed Husman in a statement.

Employers are also encouraged with the continued hiring incentive via JaminKerja with the aim of placing 300,000 people with an allocation of RM2 billion, he said.

Under this initiative, the government will subsidise 20% of the monthly salary of newly hired Malaysian employees for the first six months, and 30% for the next six months — subject to jobs with a salary of at least RM1,500.

According to the MEF, employers are looking forward to tax deductions of RM2,000 to RM7,000 to upskill employees, and the RM1.1 billion allocated for training and upskilling programmes for 220,000 trainees.

Syed Hussain said these initiatives would help alleviate rising unemployment, where the number of unemployed grew to 711,000 in 2020 from 508,200 in 2019, while youth unemployment rose to 12% or 314,000 persons in 2020 from 10.5% or 295,800 in 2019.

The MEF also welcomed the decision to extend the period of the reduced Employees Provident Fund minimum contribution rate of 9% until June 2022, and to allow small and medium enterprises to postpone income tax instalments for six months until June 30, 2022 as this would greatly help ease cash flow issues.

The RM100 million matching grants for smart automation for 200 companies in the manufacturing and services sectors would assist them to transform and streamline work processes and move up the value chain, said Syed Hussain.

"The MEF hopes the implementation of the initiatives of Budget 2022 would be done in a clear and transparent manner," he added.

See more Budget 2022 highlights here.