CORONAVIRUS | While generally lauding the government’s recently announced RM10 billion stimulus package for small and medium enterprises (SMEs), economists have called for more to be done to safeguard wage earners in the present uncertain Covid-19 pandemic era.

Wan Ya Shin, a research manager with the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs (Ideas), told Malaysiakini that while the SME stimulus package is good as it focuses on securing jobs and is more targeted to support smaller businesses, among others, there was a lack of expansion on the Employment Retention Programme.

“The self-employed in the informal sector would be left out of this scheme. It would be good to expand the Employment Retention Programme to include the informal sector through Socso (Social Security Organisation) for those who are self-employed,” she said yesterday (April 6)...