Overtime until evening
This year, the spending pressure is even greater as Ms. Thu's youngest child officially enters preschool. "The family has 3 children, on average, tuition fees are more than 4 million VND per month. At the beginning of the school year alone, I have to prepare at least 10 million VND to be enough" - Ms. Thu shared.
Although tuition fees have been waived, according to Ms. Thu, the family still has to face many other expenses such as uniforms, books, health insurance, semi-boarding meals, extra classes... Last year, in the first semester alone, her eldest child who is in 3rd grade had to pay more than 4 million VND for non-tuition fees.
To reduce the burden, during the past summer, she decided to let her eldest child study at home instead of going to extra classes. Children are also prioritized to study in public schools so that the family can maximize cost savings. But saving is still not enough. Besides tightening daily spending, Ms. Thu and her husband both try to work extra to increase income.
Although the youngest child is still young, and my husband works far away, I still try to work overtime for 2 hours every day, and only return at 7:30 pm. Each month, I earn about 3 million VND extra. My husband also limits visiting home, spending more time earning money" - the female worker said.
For Ms. Thu, prolonged overtime hours are not only an additional income but also a way for her to reduce anxiety when the new school year is approaching. Every savings have an "address" from before: Money for books for children, new uniforms or contributions at the beginning of the year.
Carrying the whole family, male worker works overtime in the evening
Sharing the same worries at the beginning of the school year, Mr. Pham Van Vinh - a garment worker - is having to calculate more carefully when his wife just gave birth and cannot go to work yet. The income of the whole family and the cost of preparing for the eldest child to enter 1st grade mostly rests on the shoulders of male workers.
My wife just gave birth to a baby, so she has to stay home to look after the baby, only having more than 5 million VND per month for maternity benefits. This amount is just enough to cover food, electricity and water for the whole family, almost no surplus is left" - Mr. Vinh worried.
In mid-August, after receiving the salary and deducting necessary living expenses, the couple tried to save 5 million VND to prepare for their child for the new school year. However, Mr. Vinh said that this amount still makes him worried because this year his child is transferring from kindergarten to grade 1, and many new expenses are starting to arise.
Among them, health insurance money, textbooks and uniforms are the items that worries him the most. According to him, the health insurance money for students this year is nearly 700,000 VND, while textbooks and uniforms announced by teachers during the summer also cost more than 1.5 million VND. Not to mention other expenses such as facilities, extra classes...
With no other source of income, the only way Mr. Vinh chooses is to try to do his job well and work overtime in the evening. For stages with high unit prices, when his skills are good and he is assigned more work, his income can increase by 1-2 million VND/month.
Both Ms. Thu and Mr. Vinh want more practical support policies for students' tuition fees, especially health insurance and textbooks. Ms. Thu proposed raising the level of health insurance support for students to 70%, and at the same time having a policy to support about 50% of textbook costs when buying at school. Mr. Vinh also hopes that the proposal to support raising young children until the age of 36 months will soon become a reality.
According to Ms. Thu, along with direct support policies for children and families of workers, the regional minimum wage also needs to be adjusted annually, with appropriate increases so that workers have more ability to cover their children's education, living expenses and prepare for the future of the whole family.
