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While Kee Chiu story is something to be admired at, frankly the statistical evidence against the Horatio Alger myth in a capitalistic system is becoming overwhelming. I am amazed at how it still holds so many poor people in its thrall, who continue to slave away creating value while only getting...

Debt in the form of well understood loans was still acceptable. It only got out of control when the bankers took a math formula and ran amok with it for almost a decade. Many knew that the formula itself was koyok but continued to package junk as AAA stuff. You should remember by this time, the...

I found that it is quite pointless to point out that there are certain things Singaporeans pay out every month without fail to... well, most Singaporeans. And that we actually pay out a lot to the government. Whatever you say, you have to give credit for the PAP for crafting revenue policies...

So at the end of the day we keep on paying for the Old Man's gloating over selling drinking water back to Malaysia. If he didn't gloat, the Malaysians wouldn't have blown a fuse and we wouldn't need to build the Marina Barrage. I wonder how much the externalities of his in-discretion will cost...

For the government, they have no choice. If they cut defence spending, alot of local companies - starting with the big ones, e.g. ST Engineering will suffer. Eisenhower warned of the dangers of the military industrial complex for America. The same problem exists in Singapore, except that the...

This is nothing new. If you start including ex-ministers and doing the list, you will never stop. The Old Man understood the fundamental nature of wealth - that it protects people from the harsh reality of life and allows them to access life paths which other people without wealth can never...

As I see it, we have already lost the productivity increases gained due to forced wage uplifting. One does not need to be a genius to realize that the biggest benefactor of importation of foreign labour are the GLCs. Sure, the MNCs might benefit, but they have internal hiring policies and...

Oh now you are simply reaching and trying to spin the whole thing into something positive. The failure of YOG to draw crowds just that - the failure to draw crowds. They essentially expected working adults take leave on a working week to go watch youths to compete against each other. To me, it...

As a man myself, frankly, there's no point blaming the woman for acts that men commit. For instance, Tiger Woods who had gorgeous Swedish wife with two kids went on sexual escapades which would not be out of place for a pornographic television series on an American adult entertainment cable...

I don't think any of us here will accept corruption. We can understand why it happens but it is not really acceptable since we intuitively understand that at the end of the day, it is the common people at the bottom of the pyramid who pay the cost for corruption. Also, corrupt practices spread...

I am actually quite surprised that this has appeared in the media, even if it is in the Chinese nightly tabloids first. Our mainstream media has kept the people largely ignorant on what goes on in the higher echelons of the government - if my memory has not failed me, they didn't even comment on...

The system of awarding scholarships is fine. Even when they return from their studies, most scholars are still pristine white sheets with their biases still weak and capable of being moulded. The unintended consequences that we absorb them all into the public sector and strengthen these biases...

Haha. Classic. Consultants can give advice and recommendations. Unfortunately, many of the problems in local companies is the lack of proper company culture and leadership, thus you have lack of motivation. In this case not even McKinsey can help you - after all, a recommendation to send...

Whatever you say about the PAP government, they are masters in indirect revenue generation. When I talk to people, most of them are not even conscious of the fact that the government has a hand in every aspect of Singapore life, starting with the land your home (even if it is private property)...

I thought the SDP formula had promise, because it was pegged to multiples of several statistical measure of the pay of Singaporeans (median and mean if I remember correctly) meaning that the ministers would have a built in incentive to ensure their policies would take into account the whole...

Everyone who has seen past their propaganda and with two working brain cells to rub together will not buy LHL's reasoning. The issue of attracting capable people has very little to do with money, everything to do with what has transpired and the dismal state of civil society and political...

I am actually amused by the whole mess since I thought after the "mee siam" thing, the first piece of advice of the older heads to new guys like him is "Avoid talking about food to get a point across. You will most likely fail".

A person with any iota of awareness of how the current schooling system came into being [it is essentially, a 19th century design] will know it desperately needs changes to make it more efficient and to equip students with the understanding and also the ability to do something with that...

I hope the words on the PAP insiders are an attempt at sarcasm on the part of the author. If the PAP rank and file really think that way, that there is no hope for the party.

Hogwash. No self-respecting economist will write down these five lines without context. Please be aware of own prejudices and biases before launching into a tirade against modern day social safety nets. Welfare + socialist state that was present in the U.K and many European countries are long...