BY: CHRISTOPHER FERNANDEZ
Though many Malaysians express hope, it is unlikely that the cost of goods and services will go down and, most likely, is that it is set to keep going up further and in this situation what are ordinary Malaysians to do?
The ordinary, average Malaysian, the man-on-the-street is already saddled with challenges in having to butter his bread and, given this scenario, they become heavily dependent on the government for handouts or have to dig into their savings.
This has witnessed a depletion of savings and investments meant for old age such as the Employees Provident Fund investment which is supposed to be set aside for retirement and so how are Malaysians to cope with rising costs?
The need for an austerity drive
The most important and pertinent thing to do is for the Malaysian government to spearhead an austerity drive where those affected by rising costs are taught and trained in a nationwide publicity campaign to cut corners to make ends meet.
This is a course of action that is imperative for the government to embark on and it must involve schoolchildren, college and university students and both the private and public sector as well as households.
The occupants of each and every household must be cost conscious and be trained to be thrifty (but not stingy) to ensure that spending of any kind is done with justification and for the right and proper purpose.
Boosting or increasing personal earnings
While businesses are run with the bottomline in mind – to make profits – Malaysians have to be on guard and vigilant against profiteers who are out to stealthily steal their hard earned money from naive and unsuspecting consumers.
While doing so, Malaysians must learn to strive to boost or increase their personal earnings and income by upgrading their skills and knowledge so they can command a better remuneration commensurate and based on higher deliverables.
This means they must be tech savvy in nature and undertake and invest in courses of study that are available to them, especially the retraining and redeployment of mature age workers, who have to defer retirement to cope with the rising cost of living.
Forming networks of support
Other aspects or ways to cope with the rising cost of living is to develop an interdependent network of support among family members, relatives, friends and colleagues to ensure sustainability and the ability to carry on with life as usual.
By this, it does not mean that a person loses his independence and ability to stand on their own two feet, but to have the necessary and vital support networking, especially financial, to tide them over temporarily during difficult times.
But getting support also means reciprocating and giving support when a person is in a position to do so to ensure fairness and equity and to understand that the basic idea of forming networks of support is to keep everyone going in life.
Exercising prudence and care
While the motivation for austerity, upgrading knowledge and skills and forming networks of support can be construed as giving casual advice, Malaysians must not get tight-fisted that it backfires on them by slowing economic growth.
All these measures must be undertaken by exercising prudence and care and a healthy balance must be struck to ensure zero level inflation while there is progress made in developing and growing the Malaysian economy.
Malaysians must work closely with the government spelling out measures for them to undertake and to co-operate closely and link themselves together with the authorities to achieve and maintain their personal growth and prosperity.
-THE MALAYSIA VOICE
** The views expressed on this opinion is of the writer and not the publisher
