Policy on Irregular Migrants in Malaysia: An Analysis of its Implementation and Effectiveness

In the early 1970s, Malaysia began to be inundated by foreign workers, all of whom were irregular migrants. A decade later their uncontrolled entry left several negative consequences especially to the internal and border security of the country. To overcome the problems, Malaysia introduced the foreign worker policy which became fully implemented in 1992. The policy has two objectives, firstly to regulate the inflow of foreign workers; and secondly, to stem the inflow of irregular migrant workers into the country. The implementation of the policy has led to a spectacular increase in the number of legally recruited migrant workers. However, it has not been able to curb the expansion of irregular migrants; instead their number has risen in parallel with that of legally recruited ones. This report is an attempt to examine why this is so. It is based on a research carried out in 2011 among 404 irregular migrants as respondents, comprising 340 who were apprehended and housed at seven of the 17 holding depots run by the government and 64 others who are still at large

Are Government-Linked Corporations Crowding Out Private Investment in Malaysia?

Private investment in Malaysia has been sluggish since the Asian financial crisis. One explanation is that the growing presence of government-linked corporations (GLCs) has been crowding out private investment. For the first time, we provide empirical evidence on the relationship between GLC presence and private investment. We find that when GLCs are dominant in an industry, investment by private firms is significantly negatively impacted. Conversely, when GLCs do not dominate an industry, the impact on private investment is not seen. To revive private investment in Malaysia, government must not only redress its growing fiscal deficit, but also expedite its program of divestment

China and India : challenges and opportunities for poverty eradication and moderating inequality in Malaysia

Malaysia has employed the mechanism of growth with equity in an effort to eradicate poverty and ameliorate inequality. During the New Economic Policy period, the government intervened extensively to ensure that all levels of society benefited from economic development and thereby maintain social cohesion. However, the increasing pace of liberalization coupled with developments in the region, such as the rise of China and India, has eroded the government’s ability to ensure the equitable sharing of the economic pie. The objective of this paper is to look at the challenges as well as opportunities posed by the rise of China and India with respect to poverty eradication and reducing income inequality. The challenges include competition for markets with the Malaysian small and medium producers, and competition for foreign direct investment. This has serious implications on employment opportunities and efforts at eradicating poverty and narrowing income disparity. On the other hand, the rise of these two giants also gives Malaysia opportunities in its effort to tackle poverty and inequality through the “prosper thy neighbour” effects, as there will be spillover from their growth and wealth accumulation. Furthermore, as China becomes integrated into the multinational regional production network, it will contribute to the improvement of trade through increased intra-trade, thus expanding exports and growth.poverty, inequality, growth, trade intensity, non tariff barriers, foreign direct investment

Income distribution and sustainable economic development in East Asia: a comparative analysis', Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the East Asian Development Network

Abstract This paper synthesizes the major findings from eight selected East Asian country studies (China, Indonesia, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam