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The Plunging Rupiah
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SiThep



Joined: 30 May 2013
Posts: 39
Location: Thailand

PostPosted: Mon Sep 16, 2013 8:52 am    Post subject: The Plunging Rupiah Reply with quote

I noticed that the rupiah has been in real trouble lately. It's down around 11,400 rupiah to the dollar. That means a teacher on 7 million rupiah a month at EF is only getting $613 a month. That's just not enough.

Any news if schools are lifting wages to respond to the weaker Indonesian currency?
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plumpy nut



Joined: 12 Mar 2011
Posts: 1652

PostPosted: Mon Sep 16, 2013 12:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Go Go Go!

I need to take a vacation there soon. Laughing
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p1randal



Joined: 23 Jun 2008
Posts: 84

PostPosted: Tue Sep 17, 2013 12:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Why would they? The plunging rupiah only has an impact if you are sending money back home (U.S.A, Canada, etc) the buying power inside of Indo hasn't really been changed. In their defense I wouldn't change unless I couldn't get people to accept jobs at that price. The bigger question is why would anyone take a job making 7 million rupiah?
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Tue Sep 17, 2013 7:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

p1randal wrote:
Why would they? The plunging rupiah only has an impact if you are sending money back home (U.S.A, Canada, etc) the buying power inside of Indo hasn't really been changed. In their defense I wouldn't change unless I couldn't get people to accept jobs at that price. The bigger question is why would anyone take a job making 7 million rupiah?


Inflation has now spiked to between 8-9% at the same time (due partly to the weaker rupiah and partly to the rising cost of petrol). That means by the end of a 12-month contract your Rp 7.000.000 will have 8% less purchasing power than when you started. Mind you, inflation has averaged 6% over the last decade, meaning that the EF wage is already some 60-70% worse than it was in 2004. (Many branches paid around Rp 7.000.000 back then, too).

Indonesia is really becoming less and less competitive in terms of wages here. EF China pays at least $1000 a month and now some EF Indonesia branches are offering only $600-$750 a month. You wonder how they still get anyone interested in this deal. I mean if you just saved $3600 at home you would now have half a year's wages at EF Indonesia. Why does anyone bother to work there?
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jef dam



Joined: 27 Apr 2010
Posts: 79

PostPosted: Tue Sep 17, 2013 12:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

p1randal wrote:
The bigger question is why would anyone take a job making 7 million rupiah?


Needs must, boss. EF is a foot in the door and, for better or worse, it's 12 months of valuable experience in a pressure free environment. It's an okay gig for new teachers and backpackers. I've been vocally critical of EF on here in the past, and I stand by my criticisms, but a sense of perspective is necessary when talking about teaching jobs that offer such low salaries.

The rupiah is the weakest I've seen it in the four and some years I've been here, not even 6 months ago it was roughly 11,000 to the Euro, it's now at nearly 16,000. I know an elderly lad who has been here for nearly 30 years. When speaking to him recently he made the point that there was a similar crash in the value of the rupiah in 1998 in the months leading up to the fall of Suharto. Hopefully this current drop in the currency isn't foreshadowing something much bigger and entirely more unpleasant.
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Puppets



Joined: 02 Feb 2013
Posts: 30
Location: Indonesia

PostPosted: Tue Sep 17, 2013 12:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Prices in the Jakarta area which includes Bekasi, Depok, Tanggerang and Bogor have definitely gone up considerably recently. This is due to both the weakening of the currency and the increase in petrol prices.

I know some Language Schools have increased their salaries but I'm not sure exactly how much or how much impact the increases have had.

English First have increased their salaries recently in Bogor and Jakarta but it's hardly substantial. I think the current exchange rates make the salary around £500 a month in Bogor and around £600 a month in Jakarta which while an improvement on the previous rates is hardly competitive.

I know from experience now that if you want to live well in Jakarta, by that I mean have a decent apartment, have money to spend each month on a few luxuries then around 12million a month should be the starting salary that most companies should be looking at which is £660 a month.

I know many teachers on around 10 million a month in Jakarta and they are struggling by payday. It's not that they live excessively it's just that Jakarta is expensive at the moment.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Tue Sep 17, 2013 3:16 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Puppets wrote:
Prices in the Jakarta area which includes Bekasi, Depok, Tanggerang and Bogor have definitely gone up considerably recently. This is due to both the weakening of the currency and the increase in petrol prices.

I know many teachers on around 10 million a month in Jakarta and they are struggling by payday. It's not that they live excessively it's just that Jakarta is expensive at the moment.


This is a good and informative post. Thanks, Puppets. I think that info will be useful to TEFL newcomers.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Tue Sep 17, 2013 3:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The "foot in the door" cliche doesn't make much sense in terms of Indonesia these days. There was an article in the Jakarta Post yesterday where the Department of Manpower were celebrating the fact that the number of expats in Indonesia is down from 77,000 to 48,000 since 2011. They eagerly mentioned that there will be new regulations next year which will get rid of even more unwanted foreigners, replacing them with Indonesians. The reality is that there are fewer and fewer positions for people in Indonesia and the easy-to-get jobs are paying peanuts. I suppose one could work at "Rumah Bahasa" (see recent thread) where even the "school manager" is on a tourist visa, or one could become one of TBI's VKU teachers on "business consultant visas" and hope Immigration doesn't raid again, but are these even half-desirable life choices?

In such a climate, one has to wonder where a career in Indonesia is leading to? The fact is, unless you have a Degree in English, TEFL or Linguistics, you can't meet the magic criteria which will open doors. You may get a "bottom-end" job at EF or TBI Bogor or other schools paying less than Rp 10.000.000 a month but where is this a ladder to?

Yes, there are a lot of teachers in Indonesia who have got by until now with fake CELTAs and/ or degrees, but the heyday of the "backpacker teacher" who comes into school 5 minutes before his class and just "has a yarn" is surely fading into the past. More doors are closing for expats in Jakarta these days than are opening. Most of these jobs are more "dead ends" than roads to somewhere exciting.
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Puppets



Joined: 02 Feb 2013
Posts: 30
Location: Indonesia

PostPosted: Wed Sep 18, 2013 2:12 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I agree with you Bradley but I don't think the Language Centre's here will like it if fewer native teachers come in to the country. They all advertise that you can learn English with genuine native speakers. That is their selling point.

Personally while I think it helps by having a native teacher it isn't everything. Personally I'd rather be taught by a good teacher regardless of whether they are a native speaker or not.
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bradleycooper



Joined: 12 Apr 2013
Posts: 310

PostPosted: Thu Nov 28, 2013 7:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The rupiah has continued to weaken. It's now been low for several months. Today it fallen to Rp 12.000 to the dollar. That's now a fall of 20% plus in recent months. Surely bottom-end schools will have to raise salaries if they want to attract teachers. Rp 9 million is now only $750 a month.
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plumpy nut



Joined: 12 Mar 2011
Posts: 1652

PostPosted: Thu Nov 28, 2013 2:38 pm    Post subject: Re: The Plunging Rupiah Reply with quote

SiThep wrote:
That means a teacher on 7 million rupiah a month at EF is only getting $613 a month. That's just not enough.




That's 593 dollars as of right now. This weakening also appears to be a trend that is going to last. If you want to teach in Indo you will want to be paid in US Dollars, I had a school in Makassar offer me payment in dollars.
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Puppets



Joined: 02 Feb 2013
Posts: 30
Location: Indonesia

PostPosted: Fri Nov 29, 2013 1:52 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yeah as of today it is 19636rp to the British Pound and 12015rp to the US Dollar. Now that is fine if you're a tourist but if you work here it does make things more difficult.

Inflation is continuing to rise and here in Jakarta it is getting more and more expensive to live.

Outside of Jakarta costs have risen but not excessively. Jakarta is where the real inflation has hit.

Now obviously getting a better job depends on qualifications, if you're a brand new teacher with no qualifications then you're probably not going to get a job in a good school. However I think anything less than 12 million a month in Jakarta means unless you live frugally money is going to be tight.

In other areas it's not such an issue, you can probably live in Bogor on 9 million a month if you live frugally but it's best not to accept anything less than 10 million a month.

I started on 7.5 million a month and that is nowhere near enough now.
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p1randal



Joined: 23 Jun 2008
Posts: 84

PostPosted: Fri Nov 29, 2013 4:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

@Plumpy

I guess I am confused to what you mean frugally. For example, say you spend 500k a week on groceries. So thats 2 million a month there and you spend 1 million every weekend on alcohol/travel. Then you are up to 6 million. That would give you 1 million left for various other things during the month. I wouldn't exactly call that living frugally and that is only making 7 million.

Moving the salary higher to say..13 you could spend 1 million per week on groceries and other stuff and 1.5 for booz on the weekend.

The biggest thing in terms of this rupiah thing is if you send money home. If you send money home for bills then it sucks. If not, you will be fine.

That being said I am a 30 year old guy with no kids and I live alone. My salary does me just fine. Some people can live on a salary others can't and it has less to do with the amount and more to do with discipline.
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Puppets



Joined: 02 Feb 2013
Posts: 30
Location: Indonesia

PostPosted: Sat Nov 30, 2013 3:38 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

It also depends on whether you want to save money or not. Most teachers I know don't care about saving money, they just want to have a good time so for them anything above 7 million a month is probably enough for them to do what they want.

I can easily live off 7 million a month but it means I won't save much money and I was always taught to save money off any salary I made.

When I first came here I earned 7.5 million a month and I managed to save around a 1.5 million a month which went towards the rent for another year.

Now I earn double my original salary and save around half of it each month, once again much of it will go towards renting a place for next year with some left over for savings.
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plumpy nut



Joined: 12 Mar 2011
Posts: 1652

PostPosted: Fri Dec 13, 2013 5:56 am    Post subject: Re: The Plunging Rupiah Reply with quote

SiThep wrote:
I noticed that the rupiah has been in real trouble lately. It's down around 11,400 rupiah to the dollar. That means a teacher on 7 million rupiah a month at EF is only getting $613 a month. That's just not enough.



It now stands at 583 dollars a month. Hopefully the prices for the piece of chicken at one of the corner stands doesn't go up to much in addition. Remember you might have to foot the costs to see a doctor after the chicken makes you sick. Laughing
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