Marcos orders study of non-wage benefits for teachers instead of salary increase

President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. has ordered the Department of Education (DepEd) to study its proposal to give “nonbasic wage benefits” to teachers instead of a salary increase.

DepEd spokesman Michael Poa said the department proposed to give teachers nonbasic wage benefits, such as allowances.

“This has already been presented to the President, and he has instructed for that to be looked into, na ‘yung mga nonbasic wage benefits, tingnan natin kung ano ‘yung mga pwede nating madagdag para sa omento ng mga take-home pay ng mga teachers,” he said.

Poa said that the government could not just implement salary increase since many factors have to be considered.

“We have to balance those things eh, kasi if we increase the basic wage of teachers, if we make it too high, it will really affect the private sector kasi either lilipat ‘yung mga teachers in the private sector to the government or baka hindi kayanin ng private sector tapatan, baka magsara ‘yung private sector,” he said.

“That’s why what we will be doing is we will be looking into nonbasic wage benefits that we can give them para naman madagdagan ‘yung take-home nila,” Poa added.