THE Government will announce by the middle of next month whether it will extend the Jobs Credit scheme - which subsidises employers for hiring Singaporean workers - beyond this year.

It is currently reviewing the necessity of doing so, taking into account factors such as the latest economic and employment outlook for the coming year, the Ministry of Finance said in a statement yesterday.

The Jobs Credit scheme, introduced as part of measures to tackle recession woes under this year's Budget, was meant to be a temporary year-long initiative.

The scheme, estimated to cost $4.5 billion, pays for part of each Singaporean worker's salary, to encourage companies not to lay them off.

At the National Day Rally last month, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong had credited the scheme, along with the Government's other measures, for helping many companies stave off retrenchment.

Earlier this month, Nanyang Technological University economists had recommended that the scheme not be extended, so that it would not affect Singapore's competitiveness.

The scheme has already given two batches of payments amounting to $1.82 billion to about 100,000 employers.

More than 100,000 employers, which hire about 1.4 million Singaporean workers, will receive a total of $890 million next Wednesday, in the third round of payments.

This will be computed based on the number of employees for whom the companies paid Central Provident Fund (CPF) contributions in July, and on the amount of wages that were paid to these employees between April and June.

The fourth - and final - round of payments will be made in December this year.

This will be computed based on the number of employees for whom companies paid CPF in October.

To qualify, employers must make the CPF contributions for these employees for July to this month by Nov 14.

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