Listen to the international conversation

Let’s put aside the national conversation and listen to the international one going on instead. Man… it’s very loud. Here we are wondering about what to do about getting people to return their trays at eating places and there is the rest of the world wondering about what to do about dialling down the level of violence.
So the Japanese and the Chinese are literally eyeballing each other over some benighted islands and the Chinese people are asserting their strength of numbers. It’s tough to be a Japanese in any Chinese city but I suppose if they don’t say a word, they could blend in.
At least that fight is a bit further away and unlike what happens whenever the North Koreans are involved – we haven’t heard talk of violence going nuclear! But then there’s that silly video which is making Muslims angry, even the Muslims in next-door Malaysia. So much for the US government distancing itself from the video. No State involvement or sanction, it says. But no, no. just because an American made the video, America must pay. So Google and the likes are blocking access to the video – a small but belated move methinks.
Old historical wounds are being opened up. The Jap-Chinese animosity goes back centuries. The Islam versus the Great Satan debate has always been simmering. Massive diplomatic work and greater economic ties don’t seem to be able to paper over the differences, and the freedom that social media brings only widens gaps. Years of bilateral and international work undone because someone wants to exercise freedom of speech…never mind a dead envoy or two…Crazy.
Can we stay immune? This little red dot? Can we keep our distance even as we host a hotch-potch of nationalities of all races and religions here? Can we still enjoy the luxury of bitching about the MRT and getting frazzled over the need for tuition for our children? Times like this makes the national conversation more, rather than less relevant, methinks. We have to settle what we want our country to be before we can think about insulating ourselves against all that international noise. One reason this LRD has been a calm oasis is that we are rich. Never mind we can’t afford landed property and the income inequality is climbing, the fact is, there’s no enough economic dissatisfaction for others to exploit.
I know we sniff at terms like national resilience, total defence and societal cohesion. I suppose we see them as brainwashing techniques to get people to toe a certain line. But that “line’’ is important – we must all have a say in what that line is and should be. One example: How tough should we get over hate speech? What’s the consensus on this?
Actually I am a bit worried about something that’s happening even further away – in the Artic. Chinese ice-breakers which want to carve out a sea-route that would allow shipping to bypass the Straits of Malacca – our very important economic artery. Will this happen in my life-time or will we see yet another fight for resources there among the Chinese, the Russians and the Canadians before this happens?
I don’t see how Singapore can sit by and make polite noises when this comes to pass. So let’s take stock while we can and add to our strengths. And let’s add some “defence’’ elements into our national conversation. Maybe we should ditch phrases like national resilience et al. Maybe we should just say Be Strong, Stay Strong.

To boldly grow old

When I turned 30, I wrote a column about coming to terms with the big 3-0. You know, can’t sign up to be SIA girl, join beauty contests etc…Frivolous stuff. When I turned 40, I found I was spending more money on potions for the face and more time in the gym. Over the past few years, I wish I could stop the family from buying me a birthday cake with its tell-tale candles…but you know what family is like…When I turn 50, I shall contemplate suicide….Okay, semi-retirement.
So yes, Matthias, you youthful 25-year old guest columnist in yesterday’s Sunday Times you, I’m starting to feel old, over the hill and far away. I think that G letter congratulating me on being a member of Eldershield when I turned 40 did the trick. I think most people try to be polite, so there’s old, and there’s old-old. I suppose I am a young-old, because middle aged is just so…old. There was a trend not long ago when people, usually celebs, start pronouncing 40 as the new 30, and 50 as the new 40 etc…Very soon, being 60 will be very sexy too. I sure hope so.
I blame the media in all its various forms for making the old look and feel older. Like how a person is such an “old dear’’. When old people make the news, it’s because they are either dying (alone), terribly sick (and alone) or they exhibit qualities that young people don’t expect, like running a marathon or playing basketball. Then they are described as “sprightly’’ or “spry’’, like everybody expects them to be in a wheelchair. Okay, I know we use the term senior citizens. A euphemism. Face it, we really mean old people. We also use the phrase the Silver generation. Funny that they were once known as baby-boomers.
Did I treat “old’’ people in the same way? Yes, I did and have written “sprightly’’ many many times – like the unfeeling young person I was. Yes, Matthias, it is the case that in Singapore, we climb the ladder superfast, and then topple off, because someone younger wants to get there. We try to make that ladder go higher, or at least put more rungs on it to give a semblance of movement.
Never mind what the G says about raising the retirement age, the perception is that once you are past 50, you make way. You go slow. The world belongs to young people, the digital natives, they should have the bigger say in the country going forward, even though you might live till 90. Maybe you shouldn’t live so long because you belong to that generation who will have to be supported by even fewer young people. You become, omigawd, a dependent. Burden on the state. Strain on the coffers.
Belatedly, I agree that older folk have a lot to teach, by sheer virtue of life experience. There is a gap between generations, then as well as now and probably forever. I boxed them up too. Now I listen hard to what the old-er people have to say, even if they are inarticulate because it is usually informed by experience. As for young people, I have watched too many articulate their views very well, but in a vacuum. I was like that too.
I don’t want to go into what older folk can give to the nation (I dowan to sound like a fuddy-duddy) but I keep wondering why people don’t realise that the older folk might not be quite the burden they are made out to be. They are better-off than their parents, better-educated and might well have a bigger voice than ever by virtue of sheer numbers. But we see them only as people who have to have rehab centres in somebody’s backyard… It’s fortunate that they are not “organised’’ don’t you think? The kind of pressure they can exert….
Sure, there are a lot of activities intended to keep them young and active, but not politically alive and alert.
I don’t know of many magazines or mediums that cater to them. Such a missed market! I recall that when I conceptualised Mind Your Body for ST, my mantra to journalists was “Young people are interested in health; old people are concerned’’. No prizes then for guessing who the target audience is. I would have a mild heart attack whenever journalists proposed “young’’ stories, like how to protect yourself when you sun-tan or the evils of anorexia. Nope, it was cataracts and knee operations for me. The readership figures vindicate the approach every time. The above 40s are loyal readers, in large numbers, and they have more money as well. And yes, they complain about the small type. What to do? Paper run by young people with good eyesight.
Imagine what a medium by older folk for older folk would be like. When it is a glamorous older person gracing the cover of the magazine. When the news is about older people chafing about the higher retirement age, about the latest fashions for the not so svelte, music that they recognise, the latest technologies/science to combat arthritis, expounding on the use of Eldershield, paying higher premiums for insurance…
I mean, women have their magazines, even the expats… Rupert Murdoch! Where are you?
Maybe in the longer term, there won’t be any surprise when a older person runs a marathon or starts a business from scratch, the way it is no surprise when a woman is picked to run a big company. Then maybe I won’t be so scared about being labelled old.
Maybe by then, Matthias, you’ll be old too.

The bottomline on bums

What is your bum worth? The comfort of a Herman Miller chair? Your lumbar protected? Not too hard for those of bony hinds? Ergonomically correct. Aesthetically tasteful. About $600? I don’t know. When I spent that kind of money on my chair for home, my heart pain….But at least, that’s MY money.

I thought only the Manpower ministry bought those sort of expensive chairs.  But seems the Attorney-General’s Chambers and SPRING did so too, according to Today. Not just one chair for the boss or something. But 472 chairs for MOM staff at $570 each (I must see what the guy at the counter sits on!).  AGC – 200 chairs for $597 each (lawyer’s bum worth more) and Spring – 28 chairs for $650 (fewer probably only for just key bums).

Wow. Can buy so many Brompton bikes for other bums which have to be mobile.

Seems like the agencies all went through the right procedures etc to procure those designer chairs, unlike the Brompton bike case. So tenders went out, bids looked at and chair selected. Selected with many criteria in mind. Can’t be the cheapest one, like the plastic ones at wakes of course. Got to be something sturdy and durable. These chairs have a 12-year warranty. Wow! That’s real long. I guess the agencies are going to use these chairs for that whole length of time….Hmmm.

Thing is, I have no idea what a good office chair is – or what it should cost. The whole un-stated charge that the public sector is paying too much for chairs have to be placed in context, methinks. What do other government agencies pay for their chairs, like ah, for the people in the Auditor-General’s office or ministries of equivalent size of MOM, AGC. Do the top 20 head honchos in MOE, Mindef  etc sit on those kinds of chairs? And what does the private sector pay for the chairs – I think they would be extra careful, since they have to watch their bottomline…Now that would be really strange…if the highly profitable companies put bums on cheaper chairs.

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Scholarship jungle

I don’t understand the rationale for this Singapore-Industry Scholarship at all! Who is it for? What is hoping to achieve? I know Education Minister Heng Swee Keat has said some things. Jargon about “complementing our core”, to build the best “multi-disciplinary team”, who can bridge “global cultural literacies” (Why can’t people speak English?). All scoped under a Singapore +++ strategy.  But boil all the jargon and catchphrases down and it’s this: The G is giving out 90 scholarships for study at local unis here, after which the scholars are bonded to serve four years in one of the 27 companies the G has picked.

Okay. You know these companies include the likes of Singapore Airlines and Resorts World Sentosa? And Boustead. BHP Billiton and Infineon? You telling me they can’t afford to put up scholarships, or already have their own? So we are grooming talent for companies which can afford talent? I mean, I can make allowances if they are home-grown start-ups or newish players like Charles & Keith or for a sector like retail, but the big boys too? National Healthcare Group doesn’t have its own scholarships?  Gosh! Shame on these big boys who have to depend on G largesse for something that is well within their means and for their own good.

Or is this scholarship about getting the best students to work at jobs that are important but not glamorous? Can’t be. The best and the brightest will go for the overseas scholarships not local ones which these industry scholarships are about. There is one qualifier: the students who are ALREADY studying overseas can qualify for this scholarship. Which is strange. So you are picking undergrads who have already decided on their choice of course and not looking at whether they are worth the scholarship?

How much is the Government pumping into this anyway? No figure’s been given. In fact, what is the worth of  Government scholarships, including those by stat boards, in all? Can’t the money be used to do other things? I know there are a couple of scholarships to do Social Work studies. Maybe the money could have gone into funding more of them? And get the bonded to serve NGOs and organisations which have difficulty recruiting talent?

I want to know why my tax money is being used this way!

People, oh people…

One of the objectives of the media must be to give citizens information to develop an opinion or make it easier for them to live their lives. Sometimes, the media points the way, taking apart a long-winded report or speech to give you the salient points (from their point of view of course) So there I was hoping that the various media have torn apart the Population report, pick out the key stuff and save me the trouble of reading the tome and figuring the statistics.

So I have from ST the point that the G wants feedback on birthrate, immigration etc. Not once, but twice within the paper. Helpfully, it seems the G has framed some discussion points like whether we would still tighten inflow of immigrants even if it means the population ages and shrinks and the foreign spouses of Singaporeans find it tough to get PR or citizenship.

I suppose there is a shock factor here: that there are plenty of Singaporeans married to foreigners who will want their spouses to live here – and they really haven’t said much in this on-going debate so far. Trouble is, how many of them – and their children – are here? ST doesn’t say but a graphic gives a 15 per cent figure of the non-resident population for dependents of citizens (old and new I presume), PRs and work pass holders.

From Today, which led off with new information instead of exhortation:

Immigration statistics revealed by the Government for the first time showed that, between 2007 and last year, the majority of those granted citizenship and permanent residence were not economically active — with the number of dependents outstripping working individuals. During this period, there were 259,040 new permanent residents (PRs) and 92,310 new citizens. Working individuals accounted for 48 per cent of the new PRs and 38 per cent of the new citizens.

I’m not so sure how to read the above statistics. So those that are not economically active are their wives and children? And if this continues, are we supposed to close the door on dependents of foreigners who want to live, and the foreign dependents of Singapore citizens?

The Today story jumps straight into population experts saying OF COURSE, you must give the foreign spouses citizenship.

One other question posed by the G which ST reported was which category of foreigners should be tightened? The maids, construction workers, your foreign spouse….Again, I guess this is to shock Singaporeans into thinking a bit deeper about the us-versus-them divide.

I wonder though if more fundamental questions should be asked, like whether we really need more people (that is, foreigners) to accelerate or maintain economic growth? Maybe, our productivity efforts will bear fruit….don’t laugh. Or if the answer is no, would we accept (without complaint or whining) a slower rate of growth in exchange for feeling better about living in our own country (yep, loaded question but that’s really what the discomfort is about right?)

BT has a rather strange angling – it was on all the G’s plan to expand infrastructure over the next decade to cope with population growth over the years, even though inflow of immigrants has fallen since 2009. So there were stats on roads, rail, housing, medical care etc and how much has been budgeted for them. Is all this new? Or is it just a compilation of past announcements? How does this plan gel with the G’s efforts to collect feedback? Is this to meet current demand? I mean, looks like everything’s fixed for the next 10 years…

Never mind all that. I hope Singaporeans, especially young Singaporeans, speak up. I say young Singaporeans (those in school, about to leave school, or just starting work) because their life experience has been shaped differently from the rest. Already, they are studying with non-Singaporeans, interacting with them, and even doing National Service with them. Their parents and older folk have been shaped differently and will perhaps veer emotionally towards maintaining the status quo or hark back to a time before S-pass holders, Chinese national hawkers and Indian IT experts.

Anyway, it’s time the whole population talked. And I guess I still have to go read that Population report for a fuller picture.

Rich list; poor list; good list

Whenever I see a “rich” list, I feel so, so poor.

My eyes glaze over the names of the usual banking, property types to pick out new names. Who are these fellows? Foreigners, or rather ex-foreigners, and some very Singaporean brand names, like Hotel 81 and Sheng Siong, this time round. Oops! I mean their founders. Interesting that BT and Today went with headlines that said The rich got richer – by 9 per cent. So…that’s the income divide fully manifested! ST buried it somewhere in the bowels of the story.

It’s great that rich foreigners have decided to become citizens and sink their lot here. Even better to see the Hotel 81 and Sheng Siong bosses get into the list. So we can all aim to be like those Singapore entreprenuers and not depend on “family” money to be in the ranking.

What’s also interesting is how the Forbes ranking gave some details of their philantrophic deeds – especially in education. Go buy BT. I suppose this provides some leavening. If you are so rich, there will be people who ask what you are doing with all that money. Churlish I suppose. You make your money, you can decide what to do with it. Except that with all that concern over income inequality, it seems in pretty bad taste to simply hoard it for your heirs.

Sometimes I wonder what would happen if there was a “poor” list instead. I guess that would be political unacceptable  and explosive. There will be complaints that the ranking method is wrong (you don’t  really hear this about  a rich list) and a lot of hand wringing and calls to do more for them. I wouldn’t feel so so rich reading a poor list. I will just feel so so bad.

I wish there was an annual Philantrophy list. I know that there are various awards given to donors and the good people. But they are varied, scattered and even ad hoc.  I want to know how those people who have benefited from being part of this place are giving back, whether in terms of their brain power or money. Will this be too onerous for our rich people? Pressuring them to give? By the way, I don’t care if they are doing it for tax purposes. Nor do I  care if this starts a race among top donors or foundation founders or scholarship boards. Better, I think, than Lim Chong Yah’s formula to cut the wages at the  top and give to the bottom. In this case, if you have extra, then give.

Let’s have a “good” list.

It would dampen the politics of envy. And make me feel so so much better.

Money minefield

Am I supposed to be worried about the economy dipping below 1 per cent growth or happy that core inflation is easing to 2 per cent? That’s the conflicting emotion you get when you read more than one newspaper. BT went for the worried angle and ST the happy one.

Actually on Tuesday, we’ve already read about inflation – that it would be on the high side. No specifics then. Now we get specifics – from 3.5 to 4.5 per cent and now 4 to 4.5 per cent. I remember how my mother complained on Tuesday that the G was telling people what they already knew – that everything is getting more expensive. Then, no mention was made of core inflation, which covers everyday stuff minus cars and housing. In fact, what was reported was the impact of inflation on different income groups. Yup. You guessed it. The poor gets hit harder.

So what is this second bite at the cherry? This time, core inflation is said to be critical. The wordings are that the core inflation forecast hasn’t been revised – its between 2.5 per cent to 3 per cent. But it will ease over the next few months to maybe 2 per cent, because oil price is lower and therefore electricity and petrol get cheaper. Yup. Excellent. But hey, when are town councils going to raise S&C charges as the ST reported today that they will do? Won’t this bring core inflation – or is it headline inflation – back up? I mean, according to MAS, June’s inflation numbers was due to no S&C rebates. Or is S&C charges part of housing cost – which is not part of core inflation….Sigh. Dunno. Confused. Give up.
Anyway, the below 1 per cent figure for growth seems to be a worst case scenario, based on factors like whether there will be a recession in the US, the eurozone implodes and a hard landing in China. MAS seems to have ruled out the last. So I guess we can still expect growth of between 1 and 3 per cent…

You know, I still can’t decide if I am going to be better or worse-off

The Tiger of Lion City

I declare today’s ST page 1 story on the Heineken bid for APB unreadable. For crying out loud, you need the patience of a saint, go over the whole thing five times, and STILL can’t make sense of who is fighting over which piece of what stuff. The article chokes you with numbers. You would have thought a graphic on all the parties and how they relate to each other would have clarified matters easily.  So thankfully, there was BT, which had a graphic. Odd, since a business paper could roughly expect that its readers would understand  the battle lines, but a general paper must expect that most of its readers would not….

Anyway, there I was trying to make sense of why this is such a big deal. A corporate battle is always interesting  I suppose, especially among big name playersand with big money. I mean, won’t I get to drink Tiger beer still? Then I turn to the Insight pages in ST about the worry pver yet another Singapore icon disappearing  into foreign hands. Hmm. Sentimental value versus business considerations? How protective should we be about our treasured icons? If we are too protective, we can’t blame other countries from doing the same to our Singapore businessmen who want a piece of something iconic from them. Some of our own already facesuch problems.

What we should be protective about is stuff that is of strategic value to Singapore - do we want PSA in foreign hands?

As Eu Yan Sang’s Richard Eu said, its the heritage, not the owner that counts. Raffles hotel is still around never mind its ownership change. While we can’t say Tiger Beer is Singapore-owned, we can say it’s a Singaporean brand (generalise a bit lah)

Kudos to the Singaporeans who make money from this battle.  May Tiger Beer live forever.

AFTERNOTE: I found a graphic in the ST Money pages. Too late. Should have been with the P1 story.

Beer talk

I have always appreciated journalists who have fun with their writing because it makes their stories so much easier to digest – or in this case, swallow. I’m talking about BT’spage 1 lead today on Mystery buyer seeks big swig of F&N and APB. The  intro is cliched enough about something  “brewing”. But there were little bits within the story which made me smile. Like how Japanese beer maker Kirin has “popped up” on the  scene and seems to be making aplay for the shares held by OCBC and its subsidiary Great Eastern Holdings. Speculation being “corked” and discussion that have been “canned”. (I didn’t know that F&N and APB make wine though…)Japanese companies having a habit of “swallowing” others.

Here’s a few others of my own – OCBC is frothing at the mouth, and Kirin’s cup will runneth over if it wins the bid and rival Heineken will be left with the bitter taste of failure. Or is this all a slip between the cup and the lip on my part?

Cheers!

Temasek’s numbers

I think like most readers, I rely on the experts to tell me how to read economics stories, especially company reports. I mean how do we decipher the significance of the mass of figures that get thrown at us. It’s likely that companies want to paint a good picture and you know what statistics are like. You can pick those that look good for you or be silly enough to pick out those that show you to be quite bad at, well, picking numbers…So what’s the real picture?

We let the journalists do the thinking for us. If they too are confused, they get other experts to talk. Then code words come in, like “record” profit or loss, share prices “tanked” or “soared”, when a company is beleaguered”, it’s just keeping its head above water. We understand verbs  and adjectives, although we have to take them with a pinch of salt because journalists like their writing spicy. Too sweet and it looks like a publicity piece. Be bitter and it looks like the journalist has something against the subject being discussed.

I read the Temasek story today in ST, Today and BT. I read ST and BT first and wondered if they were talking about the same company. An ST reader of headlines would come away think Temasek is really hot. Temasek portfolio rises to record 198billion. Then comes the ‘but’ – shareholder returns shrink to 1.5 per cent. A BT reader will read that  its full year profit is down 2b at 10.7b. Then comes the ‘but’ – its portfolio grew to 198b, up by 5b.

I suppose as a smaller paper, BT would have to find a different angle. It didn’t even put it on p1 probably anticipating that ST would. Today, which fancies itself as ST’s direct rival, had the same angle as ST.

For economics news though, I depend on BT to give me the fuller, more specific picture.   I know from BT why the profits went down – not due to turbulent times in europe or elsewhere, but at home with companies here performing  worse than before. And which companies. What are we to make of the 198 b portfolio? It’s technically a record, but is a 5b rise a big deal? BT merely mentioned it in its story, adding that Temasek did NOT disclose its net cash position. Am I to infer something from this? Am I also to infer something from BT reporting that Temasek would not disclose the profit or loss on its divestments ?

The other interesting point was how share holder returns went to 1.5 per cent, down from 4.6 per cent. Looks a lot but you have ST reporting Temasek saying that it beats the returns of other key regional index. And you have BT saying it’s well below the  annualised inflation rate of 2.5 per cent.

Dear oh dear, can an expert weigh in on the Temasek report please?  What did it do right or wrong? Was it a good thing that it increased its investments abroad and move into energy and resources? Some analysis and insight please - don’t mean just giving pithy sound bites and quotes that even I can come up with.