The government's rationale for the massive influx of foreign workers is that Malaysians shun 'dirty, dangerous and demeaning' jobs. A smarter, and in the long run cheaper, solution would be to make those jobs less dirty, less dangerous, and less demeaning. Better yet, get rid of them.

If Malaysia were to admit foreigners, I would prefer that they be the highly skilled, educated and talented. They would then add to the quality of our human capital and economy. Those illiterate maids and unskilled labourers do nothing more than to make Malaysians feel superior.

Having Indonesian maids is a way for non-Malays in particular to vicariously compensate for their perceived inferior treatment from the Malay officialdom. These low-skill foreigners do not enhance our talent capital, they also do not improve the gene pool when they marry locals.

Cheap labour never confers meaningful or long term competitive advantage. Labour is only a small portion of the total cost of any enterprise. Even in a labour intensive industry like healthcare where labour cost is significant, only a very small fraction of that is for low skill jobs, the rest are for highly paid technologists, nurses and physicians. Besides, there will always be someone somewhere who can offer his or her services cheaper. China is using prison labour for free, try competing against that!

Malaysia has to climb up the value chain in labour, that is, make its workers more skillful and productive in order to deserve premium pay. Failure to do that would destine the nation to a permanent third rate status economically.