Spoken like an emperor (with no clothes)

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Tuesday, 20 October 2009

Singapore Democrats

“Never mind your Gini coefficient,” Mr Lee Kuan Yew told his audience at the National University of Singapore on Sunday night, “If you don't have a job you get zero against those with jobs.” In other words don't gripe about how much you are paid, just be glad you have a job.

End of discussion.

The MM was arguing against Minimum Wage, a policy that the SDP had proposed almost 10 years ago, the first opposition party to do so. It is also one where Mr Lee argued would bankrupt Singapore if introduced.

Isn't this the same man who foretold that Singapore, just months before the country entered into its worst recession ever, was about to experience a “golden period [that] can stretch out over many years”? (See also Holding Lee Kuan Yew Accountable)

Mr Lee said that employers would hire less people if wages were to rise as a result of Minimum Wage. What he doesn't understand, or want to acknowledge, is that higher wages would also mean more disposable income and spending power of workers.

In a rational economy, this would increase spending and consumption which would lead to expansion of businesses. The result is more hiring, not firing.

Of course this works up to a point where wages do not outstrip productivity. The Singapore Democrats have repeatedly argued that the other extreme where wages go beyond the means of businesses is just as undesirable.

This is where market forces come in, the kind where labour is free to organise and negotiate with management. Not the kind that the MM espouses where NTUC masquerades itself as the trade union and where the National Wages Council, on which foreign businessmen sit, determine the pay of Singaporeans.

Consider this: When the late Ong Teng Cheong, former president, deputy prime minister and NTUC chief, sanctioned a strike in the shipping industry, he did not tell the cabinet about his decision because his colleagues would have stopped him. "The minister for trade and industry was very angry," Ong revealed, "his officers were very upset. They had calls from America, asking what happened to Singapore?—we are non-strike." (emphasis added)

Depriving workers the ability to speak up while allowing corporations to dictate wage levels is not market forces. It is bad policy making. It is exploitation. It is greed.

It is also unsustainable. Society is going to be so drained of spirit if we keep paying our workers lower and lower wages that our competitiveness and productivity will be critically undermined. Economist and management expert (the late) Peter Drucker wrote:

…I have often advised managers that a 20:1 ratio is the limit beyond which they cannot go if they don’t want resentment and falling morale to hit their companies. I worried back in the 30’s that the great inequality generated by the industrial revolution would result in so much despair that something like fascism would take hold. Unfortunately, I was right. Today I believe it is socially and morally unforgivable when managers reap huge profits for themselves but fire workers. As societies, we will pay a heavy price for the contempt this generates among the middle managers and workers.

Unfortunately, he was right again. The current economic crisis gripping the world is a result of unbridled greed fuelled by the lust for control and power.

Such a trend is magnified in Singapore. Already productivity has been declining in the recent past. And according to a survey by marketing group Taylor Nelson Sofres, Singaporeans are more likely to suffer from depression, stress and fatigue than our Asian counterparts.

So don't worry about the Gini coefficient, Mr Lee says? Pay the the top any amount it demands, and then keep the wages of workers down?

The MM is obviously still living in his “golden period” days. No runner can hope to compete if he only takes care of his brains and not his legs. If we fail to take a holistic view of progress we are headed straight for doom.

The NUS talk was set up with one objective and one objective only – to make the MM appear as god-like as ever and for him to talk at the people again.

With no one from the cabinet to the civil service to the media willing to tell the emperor he has no clothes, Singaporeans are in for an even rougher ride ahead. Fasten your seatbelts.

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Comments (15)

Tue 20 Oct 2009 6:39 PM | compassion republican - Harry Speech

Hello, Guys have anyone seen Harry speech on CNA ? His comments on raising his own kids at Istana. Why did CNA choose those sounds bites ?? Hmmm, they finally figure out these are hard times and they know S'porean are suffering. Are selling the message "I can feel your pain" maybe they trying to (Patronize S'porean??) its not secret we do know those Elitism Salaries Is Obscene. Maybe a "Spin Doctor" is trying to manipulate public sentiment. Nice try, we are all in the "same boat" however the Elitism lived in top class cabinet of the ship while S'porean lived in the noisy dirty engine room.

Tue 20 Oct 2009 7:10 PM | BryanT - To each his ....mouthpiece.

I think the political reality is that if the "old man" is a greenhorn politician who has just inaugurated a political party to contest elections, he is unlikely to get a toe into parliament if he continues to talk with such insensitivity.

Staring at the Gini coefficient may be inane from an socio-economic viewpoint, but it would have the younger (or even older) electorate tearing their collective hairs out, or perhaps their vote papers as well. Tomfools ignore the lower strata of society at the risk of their political careers.

He probably thinks that he has a few things to teach those still wet behind their ears, or even the history-ignoramuses. And it's probably true that he has quite a few good fables to recite and lessons to preach, but I think [b]the younger lot has since grown more critical, less partisan, or tolerant of age-old "gospel rules" more befitting the colonial and communist era.[/b]

At last, old men like him and many of us here are afflicted with the same mental problem -- old nagging habits are hard to break. So give us all a break if we tend to repeat ourselves, and forget that we have said it about 28 times. (Perhaps SDP is coming of age too, since some messages, acts and protestations seem rather repetitive at times too)

However, the article's statement that "the NUS talk was set up with one objective and one objective only – to make the MM appear as god-like as ever" is not fair.

SDP communicates mainly and rather effectively via the internet (although I won't call the pavement and market square remonstrations effective communication).

In contrast, LKY's mode is less high-tech, allows for his facial expressions to pervade the audience and probably captivates better (.... not "captive" in the incarcerating sense).

[b]To each his ....mouthpiece.[/b]

Tue 20 Oct 2009 8:13 PM | jmiahlee

speech of a tyrant
voice of the devil

why pay himself n his family
so bloody much at the expense of
us citizen

and use the law to squeeze us dry

where is justice?
where is retribution?

Tue 20 Oct 2009 8:54 PM | compassion republican - SPH & CNA

Hello, when Harry speak. The next following days, Harry soft news all splash on SPH papers and CNA television for weeks if not months, they re-run the message until S'porean get it. For years this is the trend, this a Monopoly Trade until now. Finally, we got the break that we had been waiting for. (More Level Playing Field for the New World) introducing "Amazon Kindle" Wireless Device. Now S'porean can download "New York Times Newpapers" in less than 30 seconds before you wake up. (Which means S'porean can download SDP newspapers, WP party newspapers...etc on daily basis the right to response, to explain their policy to the public) From today onwards it would be very diffcult to manipulate public sentiment. In the near future, all laptop computors will have Monitors that is built in with Amazon Kindle device. All you just need to do remove the monitor and it become like a Kindle. A must item for christmas.

Tue 20 Oct 2009 10:38 PM | leesjuanpat

The emperor has outlived his reign. His inability to vanish himself and still projected a figure of declining authority, is a sad sight to behold.

The social implication of holding all citizens at ransom of a minimum wage but enriched themselves with bastardly wages, speaks volumes of LKY's love for the very citizens that vote him and elevated him to his prominence to this day. A total letdown to the voters.

Every facet of life is being curtailed.
Worst than a communist state. What Gini co-efficient? LPPL.

LKY is not a clairvoyant. His senses are
dull now. His reflexes stigmatised to have NUS staged a wayang show to plant
selected questions for his smooth answers. A total disgrace to NUS and to LKY. Where has your quick-wittedness gone? A sad image of a once great founding father of S'pore unable to compromise himself with a gracious exit from power.

LKY's legacy will just be his silhouette
of his early years of glory, nothing more.

Tue 20 Oct 2009 10:48 PM | quantum

[quote]However, the article's statement that "the NUS talk was set up with one objective and one objective only – to make the MM appear as god-like as ever" is not fair. [/quote]
If it is not fair , then I would expect clowns like you to be there to ask difficult questions. But hey, did you see any? No . You see people 'asking': You are great. How do you want us to remember you? You are great. Basically, no one is asking any real questions. They are there to praise him, to raise his ego because he likes it. Maybe he has got a self-esteem problem.

Wed 21 Oct 2009 1:53 AM | fongmy - May I Ask ? What Kind Of Father ?

Dear Readers,

"the NUS talk was set up with one objective and one objective only – to make the MM appear as god-like as ever"

May I ask you all, how much do you know about LEE KWAN YEW ? Is he SINGAPORE Step Father ? or worst !!! The Mafia God Father ?

Why can't our local borned citizens see what is LEE KWAN YEW ? And what is he "UP TO" ?

TO me, LEE KWAN YEW is a DICTATOR ! Singapore Patriotism must Uncover his bad objectives and kick him out before anything WORST DONE TO OUR COUNTRY !

Fongmy

Wed 21 Oct 2009 10:13 AM | maxchew - LKY must go before he causes more problems.

Don't wait for him to die first b4 doing anything to get rid of him and his sycophantic cabinet and elite supporters.
He may well expire (either dead or braindead not unlike his wife now) in say 3-5 years time but may bring all of us down with him to an economically doomed Singapore.
His spirit will then laugh at us all the way down to Hell!

Wed 21 Oct 2009 4:10 PM | btan

Does anyone noticed that our national attitude, especially things like arrogance and lack of sensitivity (also kiasuism) is a mirror of this person's personality?

Not that everyone is like that but that is how Singaporeans is perceived to be.

40 years of one-man rule does this to its citizens I guessed.

Wed 21 Oct 2009 6:07 PM | shamszee - re:

[quote=quantum][quote]However, the article's statement that "the NUS talk was set up with one objective and one objective only – to make the MM appear as god-like as ever" is not fair. [/quote]
If it is not fair , then I would expect clowns like you to be there to ask difficult questions. But hey, did you see any? No . You see people 'asking': You are great. How do you want us to remember you? You are great. Basically, no one is asking any real questions. They are there to praise him, to raise his ego because he likes it. Maybe he has got a self-esteem problem.

[/quote]

the problem with this kinda session and all, whoever is gonna participate, they get you to register and few weeks b4 tis session, they will e-mail u to ask if there's any questions u wld like to raise during the session. they will den prepare an answer according to what they want you to hear. if u notice, they answers ur qns promptly and smoothly not pausing enuff to think thru wat u asked them... it's a trick to answer u where u cant argue the point cos it's all structured well...

therefore, however u ask a question, it is all well structured b4 the session...

Wed 21 Oct 2009 8:30 PM | compassion republican - Morally right or wrong?

Mr Speaker, may I put this to the house the conservative party constantly reminded us the importance of having (Mouth-Watering Salaries) for their Elitism. That is supposed to keep corruption at bay. Today, that same conservative party believed it is socially and morally unjust, unforgivable when Managers to reap huge profits to serve themselves that there is now an urgent need to do the right things. The bonus culture do required some fixing. That being said, may we concluded A)the conservative party "flip flops" their position B)finally, they had found their conscience C)they want to appear human, to connect with the people, to score politically points D)both topics are not inter-connected. Be it Elitism Mouth Watering Salaries are different from Manager Obscene Salaries...yeah yeah yeah

Sat 24 Oct 2009 12:57 AM | quantum

[quote]therefore, however u ask a question, it is all well structured b4 the session... [/quote]
Then you may as well put a programmed LKY-bot there.
Something like this kind:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVMtRdUo98k&feature=related

Tue 27 Oct 2009 1:02 PM | BoredAccountant - SDP is Wrong on the Minimum Wage

A misguided article. As much as I disagree with the PAP's manner of government, the PAP and LKY is correct on the issue of minimum wages. The rate of productivity growth is dismal in Singapore. Whether this poor result is the fault of the PAP is besides the point. The situation exists and must be dealt with as such. A minimum wage will drive manufacturing, especially lower skilled manufacturing jobs, to countries like China and Vietnam. Even with a pliant trade union and low wages, Singapore is losing its manufacturing base to other countries. The SDP's argument that raising wages via a minimum wage will increase disposable income and purchasing power without a matching increase in productivity is not convincing. Any nominal increase in wages may be offset by increasing prices given the increased cost of production, assuming that the manufacturers stay in Singapore.

It is also regrettable that the SDP is trying to score political points by being xenophobic and portraying foreign investors as the enemies of the Singapore worker when in fact it is foreign investments that is largely responsible for Singapore's economic prosperity. There is a reason why countries like Ireland, China, India and many others are pursuing the foreign investments and capital, especially foreign direct investments, that the SDP is so suspicious of.

The PAP has much to answer for. It's stifling policies have undoubtedly contributed to the lack of entrepreneurial spirit in Singapore and its immigration policies appear to be a desperate short term measure to boost economic growth. However, given the situation, the imposition of a minimum wage is not a plausible long term solution.

Fri 30 Oct 2009 5:45 PM | yoojinchil - re:

[quote=btan]Does anyone noticed that our national attitude, especially things like arrogance and lack of sensitivity (also kiasuism) is a mirror of this person's personality?

Not that everyone is like that but that is how Singaporeans is perceived to be.

40 years of one-man rule does this to its citizens I guessed.
[/quote]

Yes,I have noticed it and I agree with your comments 100%.

That is why WE need to engineer a change in party in power here over the next 10,20 or even 30 years.

NO MILITARY COUP.NO FRENCH REVOLUTION.Only peaceful transition of power.

From PAP to the Opposition parties(SDP/WP/SDA/NSP/RP).

Sat 31 Oct 2009 10:54 AM | BryanT - eaceful transition is the best

"NO MILITARY COUP.NO FRENCH REVOLUTION. Only peaceful transition of power."

yoojinchil, I agree that a peaceful transition is the best and even if we can't achieve it, we will benefit from the attempt.

Many here, and that probably includes SDP and myself, would welcome new ideas to achieve that. Perhaps you can share with us what what you think are the possibilities and ways.