VietNamNet Bridge – A big real estate developer has been reportedly
hospitalized to treat his mental disease. Thousands of bachelors in Da Nang City
now work as blue collar workers at an electronics company. An architect has
become a helper at a pho shop. In the economic recession, Vietnamese would take
any job they can to earn their living.
The real estate market is gloomy
University degree cannot bring jobs
About 1,000 bachelors have been working at Poster Electronics Company Ltd in Da
Nang City as blue collar workers.
Le Duy Luong, Human Resource Director of the company, has confirmed that nearly
1,000 out of the 16,000 workers there have university degrees. Many of them have
two university degrees, while many of couples – husbands and wives – have
university degrees and both have been working for the company.
However, Luong said the actual number of workers with university degrees is
higher than the reported figure. It is because many workers with university
degrees feel ashamed about their jobs as blue collar workers, decided to hide
their degrees. A lot of workers are believed to finish universities, but only
showed their high school degree.
There was also another reason that prompted the bachelors to hide their
university degrees: until 2009, the company had refused the candidates with
university degrees for fear that they would leave the company for new better
jobs.
Since 2010, the company has applied a new recruitment policy, accepting the
candidates with university degrees. However, as Luong admitted, it is a big
waste of the labor force. All of the recruited workers have received the same
training and they now only undertake certain works in the company’s earphone
production line.
Architect serves at pho shop
D was once an interior decoration architect for a big construction group in
Hanoi. But now he is simply a helper at a pho shop in Hanoi.
In the economic recession, the big group, like many others, also incurred loss
and had to lay off workers. D, who graduated from the Hanoi Architecture
University, and had good experiences, has become redundant since pre-Tet days.
D decided to cooperate with a friend to set up a small consultancy firm
headquartered on Pham Hung road. However, they later had to shut down the firm
because of no client.
Becoming unemployed, but D needs to earn money for his life in Hanoi, where he
lives in a rent room. Therefore, though feeling ashamed, D still decided to work
as a helper at a pho (rice noodle served with meat) shop.
D said he has been living with the modest pay of VND3-4 million a month he
receives from the job of helper at the pho shop. “In the current difficult
period, no one would spend money to build houses, therefore, interior decoration
architects like us have become jobless,” he complained.
Well known real estate developers suffer mental disease
Nguyen Van Dung, a doctor from the Bach Mai Hospital, has confirmed that he has
received some special patients.
The common characteristic of the patients is that they were the big guys in the
real estate development who have become seriously ill because of the
unprofitable business deals due to the sharp fall of the real estate prices.
One of them was very young, aged 32, from Ung Hoa district in Hanoi. The man,
who was a well-known real estate trader in Hanoi, could not pay debts because of
the frozen real estate market, suffered heavy stressed and then depression. He
was hospitalized for treatment and discharged from hospital some days before Tet.
Manh Ha