UNCONSTITUTIONAL, PROHIBITED, a hindrance to skill development—these were the words the 2016 presidentiables used to describe contractual labor. In a series of debates held last April, marked by disagreements and rebuttals, contractualization was an issue all five candidates unanimously stood against. Promises of abolishing the practice were made as soon as President Duterte was elected in office.

The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) estimates that 416,000 Filipinos are contractual laborers. This many are at the receiving end of employers’ possibly exploitative and abusive practices. Their jobs have expiration dates; they undergo the end of contract or “endo” scheme before the end of the five-month mark—three-month if probationary—of being employed.

Aside from endo, contractual employees may also experience what Atty. Ces Alvero Azucena Jr. of the Philippine Daily Inquirer calls “deceptive contractorship.” This involves the repeated renewal of a contractual employee’s contract. In this way, the employer is able to keep its labor supply intact while workers never become regular employees. They remain outside the scope of being legally entitled to benefits besides mandatory ones such as SSS and PhilHealth. Articles 106 to 109 and 294 of the Philippine Labor Code regard this practice as unlawful.

Industrial psychologist Emerald Jay D. Ilac, PhD of the Psychology Department says that contractualization is highest in the food and service industries. But that is not to say that contractual labor is hard to find in the university setting: In the Ateneo, contractual labor is still practiced in the Gonzaga cafeteria.

A perishable labor

Hired by the Ateneo de Manila Multi-Purpose Cooperative (AMPC), the joint enterprise that manages the cafeteria, Lisa* works on a three-month contract basis. She started working for AMPC early this year and has since had three job descriptions, including food server, office worker, and cashier – each position is valid for one contract.

The most recent job she’s been assigned to in the cafeteria ends in the near future. Right now, Lisa feels secure about being renewed for her next term. Still, like most contractual employees, she admits she gets antsy about her job, particularly when classes suspend.

“Iba kasi ‘yung regular sa contractual. Kasi pag-contractual ka, on-call ka lang. Mas maganda kung regular, kasi ‘pag [contractual ka], walang estudyante, wala kang trabaho, hindi ka papasok, unlike ng regular na kahit umuulan, bumabagyo, walang estudyante, may trabaho sila (Contractual workers are different from regular ones. If you’re contractual, you work on call. It’s better to be regular because if you’re contractual, no students means no work, unlike regular employees who have work even if there’s a storm and there aren’t any students),” Lisa shares.

With inconstant wages and punctuated employment periods, contractual workers in AMPC have less stable income. AMPC follows a no-work-no-pay policy for contractual workers; if classes are suspended in the Loyola Schools, Lisa receives no payment that day, unlike regular staff. On days when there are classes, however, Lisa and others like her earn minimum wage (Php 491), minus SSS, PhilHealth, and PAG-IBIG fees.

Ana*, a cashier who has been a regular AMPC employee for decades, sympathizes with the plight of her contractual peers. “Sila walang [separation and retirement pays]. Kumbaga [kahit] 10 years na sila [nagtatrabaho], hindi na [nabibilang] ‘yung 10 years nila noon…kaya kawawa sila, (Contractual workers don’t have separation and retirement pays. In other words, even if they work for 10 years, those 10 years in service won’t matter. That’s why I pity them),” Ana explains.

According to Ana, one out of every five AMPC employees is contractual. AMPC maintains a constant number of regular employees, but hires contractual workers depending on demand. For instance, during intersession, AMPC lets off non-regular workers. Once the standard academic term rolls in, they are then contacted by AMPC and re-hired if their previous performance was satisfactory.

However, even if they are hired again by AMPC and continue the onerous cycle of employment-unemployment for years, they are not given salary hikes, separation pays, or retirement benefits, which regular employees enjoy.

Ana says that instances like this happen far too often to the non-regular employees: It is common for AMPC to repeatedly renew the terms of contractual workers for years without regularizing them, withholding the benefits they deserve.

Though such is the case, Lisa still hopes AMPC eventually regularizes its contractual workers, calling being regular “pangarap ko (my dream).” Lisa asks, “Hindi po ba meron nang pangako si Duterte ngayon na wala nang endo? Sana naman matuloy na. (Didn’t Duterte promise to abolish endo? I hope it pushes through)”

While legitimate contractualization is not illegal, Trade and Industry Secretary Ramon Lopez proposes an end to contractualization through the direct hiring of employees by companies or the regularization of employees in agencies. According to Ana, AMPC plans to absorb its contractuals this December, provided that said employees pass the necessary evaluations. When asked regarding this, AMPC management declined to comment.

A conflict of interests

Unfortunately for employees like Lisa, the abolition of contractualization also has its flaws. Ilac explains, “Imagine I have 100 contractual employees and the law is to regularize all. So out of the 100, I can only afford to regularize five or ten. I’ll remove contractual workers, but I’m not going to regularize everybody because [employers] also have their limits. Why will they pay for every one of the [contractual employees’] benefits if they can’t afford it?”

The elimination of contractualization could spell an increase in the unemployment rate and prices of a company’s goods and services. Also, the transition of an employee from contractual to regular is dependent on whether the applicant is competent enough to be hired permanently. Consequently, the enforced regularization of all endo workers could lead to a decrease in the quality of services and products of a firm.

Though narratives on the experiences of contractual workers paint a grim picture of the abusive practices co-occurring with contractualization, Ilac admits that some want to be contractual. These people seek the horizontal mobility offered by short-term jobs that allow them to amass a varied background under multiple firms.

“Not everybody [wants to be regularized]. What’s their purpose? They want to move from one food industry to the next so that they could gain so much experience from different brands, so that they could go abroad [or find the best company]. Then they could brag that they have been through so many brands that they already how [the industry] works. They don’t want to be tied up,” Ilac says.

But Ilac too acknowledges the detrimental effects that contractual labor has on workers. Being foremost an industrial psychologist, he explains that contractual labor has repercussions on the psyches of workers, causing them to suffer anxiety whenever their contract nears its end.

“Normally what happens is that when people hit the [the last month of their contract], they start to feel anxious. Some contingent workers start to apply for different organizations because they don’t want to have lax time, especially if they have a family, if they have a kid to feed,” Ilac points out.

Ilac recounts that often workers who have their contracts terminated also have the development of their work-related skills cut short. He says that while there can be horizontal mobility, there is little vertical growth when it comes to contractual labor.

“For example, if I was working in The SM Store, and I was just selling perfumes, that would be my competency for five months. After five months, it ends. Where will I use again that same skill set? It’s now useless unless I apply again in [a similar firm], say, Robinsons. So there’s no unity, there’s no continuity, and there’s no cohesion of skill sets,” Ilac argues.

A tension in teachings

Given the negative consequences of contractual labor on workers, Marc Oliver Pasco of the Philosophy Department sees no virtue in the practice. Though he concedes that there are economic justifications for contractualization, from his philosophical standpoint, one cannot prescribe a monetary value to an individual’s labor. “We value and recognize the dignity of labor,” says Pasco as he explains why the Philosophy Department includes the Junior Engagement Program (JEEP) in its curriculum.

“So wala kaming nakikitang dignity doon sa pinagtitripan mo ‘yung manggagawa mo every five months. Sigurado sa buhay nila may utang sila sa 5-6…na may mga anak silang kailangan dumede…na magkakasakit ‘yung mga ‘yon…na magbabayad sila ng renta. Sigurado lahat ‘yon; sabay ang hindi pa sigurado: employment. (So we don’t see any dignity in the way firms toy with their employees every five months. Employees have loans, children to feed; these children will get sick, and rent has to be paid. Those are all sure things, but the one thing that’s uncertain is their employment),” he says.

Despite the Ateneo’s initiatives to dignify the laborer, practices within the campus still burden workers like Lisa with the same uncertainty Pasco describes. With erratic wages and employment periods, minimal benefits, and abysmal hopes for career progression, contractual workers in the Ateneo are a bleak reality that contrasts with the institution’s idealistic teachings on labor.

Regardless of what politicians say, the entire system of contractual labor is unlikely to be abolished, and a firm that does so risks raising its prices and lowering the quality of its services. Considering the exploitative aspects of this practice, however, one question remains for the Atenean: Can you stomach the expiration date on the worker you face?

*Note: Names have been changed at the request of the interviewees.