[GPGT] GOH MENG SENG criticise Chen Show Mao speech + responses from netizens

[scroobal]

The issue of compensation for politicians is difficult. There is no P&L statements and balance sheet to provide guidance. What is however clear is like shareholders, the electorate has to be happy with whatever formula or model that is used. The common denominator for all voters is either income or wealth. It is therefore natural that this comes up as a possible primary variable.

Personally my preference is to model it against the British model where the pegging is done against the civil service benchmark. Both are public service. To retain the best in the civil service, the salary is periodically adjusted against the general income of the general public.The mean income however is gaining currency as it will help close the gap in the gini coefficient score.

The other things is that you are taking their interpretation of welfare to the extreme. Nobody wants to feed deadbeats. A meaninful and sustainable safety net is what has been called for. Its meant for the needy and the unfortunate. It is not meant for lazy, the hopeless and the undesirables.

It can hardly be called a "serious" debate.What we have here is a bunch of airheads who actually believe that the remuneration for an important job like running the country should be determined based on the income levels of a bunch of lazy, unmotivated layabouts unable or unwilling to pull their weight like the rest of the productive members of .

 

[Leongsam]

A meaninful and sustainable safety net is what has been called for. Its meant for the needy and the unfortunate. It is not meant for lazy, the hopeless and the undesirables.

All welfare states start off with good intentions but welfare is like cancer. It spreads to other organs and is impossible to stop.

In NZ, unwed mothers with 7 children get more from welfare than a mid level manager does working a 50 hour week. It has become a way of life.

However, it didn't start off that way. In the early days, unwed mothers were victims of cruel circumstances. They had been bedded by unscrupulous males and discarded after they'd served their purpose. The whole of society felt really sorry for them. They were innocent victims who had ended up with a mouth to feed with no means of earning a living.

Half a century later, being an unwed mother is almost big business. It costs the country millions in welfare checks and no political party seems to have the will or the ability to put a stop to this gravy train.

If Singapore goes down this route, it will be the beginning of the end.

 

[Nice-Gook]

I disagree with that fundamental concept. Let's put the PAP and their flaws aside for the moment. No matter what the scenario be it country or company, the best way to get the best performance out of a team is for all the members of a team to see what it's like to reach the top. It will motivate them to try harder and the whole team benefits as a result.

So when the majority of Singaporeans witness how the top players in society are rewarded, it should inspire them to achieve greater heights and the whole nation benefits from this constant tussle to be on the top of the heap.

Any govt, PAP, WP, SDP.. whoever runs the country should concentrate on ensuring that hard work and high achievement must have it's just rewards while mediocrity should be punished.

Sam,no PAP,WP or SDP ...or any government for that matter can coach and coax you individually to climb to the top..or reach to best of your ability.Government is not in the business of parenting.But to provide the platform so that there are opportunities available for everyone to climb to the best of their ability.The rest is up the individuals.

Again no matter how much one is inspired ---the top places only belongs to a very few.That's how nature dictates.For each Olympic participant there are thousands who could not make it.Not for lack of trying nor being inspirational..

Anyway,I had argued governments does very little to produce top earners.In fact,it could very well be the reverse.People become billionaires because of corruption,connections and as in most third world countries.And even if the whole county goes kaput--there would be always someone who can capitalize on a nations' misfortune.As the Jewish saying goes,'buy when you hear the cannon booms and sell when the troops retreat' ..Proof of that is all that dirty money hidden in Singapore as a haven by fugitives from this region.Hence,if you believe top dollars are earned by mere motivation inspiration and hard work than you are rather naive for your age.

Anyway,I think you are digressing

 

[Leongsam]

Sam,no PAP,WP or SDP ...or any government for that matter can coach and coax you individually to climb to the top..or reach to best of your ability.Government is not in the business of parenting.But to provide the platform so that there are opportunities available for everyone to climb to the best of their ability.The rest is up the individuals.

I'm not expecting governments to coach or inspire. All they need to do is provide a framework whereby innovation and hard work is rewarded. This means building infrastructure, providing legal protection for intellectual property and legal recourse when such laws are broken.

Once this is created, I'm all for nature taking its course and if that includes some being left by the wayside, then so be it.

I'll be perfectly blunt. While everyone is talking about "helping the poor". I say "screw the poor". If there is any other role for the govt, it should be about ensuring that that those who deserve to be poor end up being so.

 

[Nice-Gook]

I'm not expecting governments to coach or inspire. All they need to do is provide a framework whereby innovation and hard work is rewarded. This means building infrastructure, providing legal protection for intellectual property and legal recourse when such laws are broken.

Once this is created, I'm all for nature taking its course and if that includes some being left by the wayside, then so be it.

Precisely,so we agree on how the government should manage.To provide the opportunities and facilitate one and all.

But how to measure the government's success?Certainly not from top earners.But by looking at how people in the bottom bracket are uplifted.Why?By the very fact their numbers are huge---and therefore their upliftment reflects an equitable distribution of wealth.

See,it's quite simple.Me wonder why the need for 80 over intelligent MPs to argue endlessly about such matter.

 

[Fook Seng]

I don't know when you came into existence but when Singapore was still a British Colony, it looked very much like a basket case through my eyes. Sanitation was non existent. Running water was a luxury. So was electricity. The currency was worthless. Roads in the outlying areas were nothing more than m&d tracks which were unusable when it rained.

If Singapore were to remain as what it was 50 years ago, not only would Singapore not have expanded and progressed over the years, it would have slipped with respect to all other developing countries as modernization took hold throughout the world. At least you did not go as far back as a 100 years to the fishing village days to find the benchmark.

 

[@rmadill0]

I have already said, WP's fundamental point of pegging the pay to the civil servant is oxymoron. i.e. there will be conflict of interests if ruling party wants to increase civil servant pay. It is not just simple dollar value.

Listen carefully to Gerald's speech. On one hand, he admitted that very very few government around the world give bonuses to political appointees (except Japan) BUT in the end, WP still agrees to bonuses of maximum 5 months! I have already made myself very clear that political appointees should not be awarded bonuses; if they don't perform, it is the job of voters to vote them out next round.

Goh Meng Seng

GMS,

Regardless whether they pegged it to the top 1000 private top earners or the civil servants, they can still up their salaries as and when they want it as long as they are in power.

Under current circumstances, if the economy booms in 5 year's time and the top earners are earning twice as much they are earning now, they can happily collect two times more since the agreed formula is to pegged to them. However, do you believe that civil servant will have their salary doubled in the same period?

Both systems are flawed but until a perfect one is found, I prefer the WP's proposal.

 

[Leongsam]

Precisely,so we agree on how the government should manage.To provide the opportunities and facilitate one and all.

While it may not be the government's job to provide a parenting or coaching service, I have to say that the person who has influenced my life more than any other is none other than the great LKY.

His wisdom has been my guiding light. From him, I learned early in life that there was no such thing as a free lunch, that we determine our own destinies, that competition for resources is fierce and unforgiving and downright dirty, that people aren't born equal, that the best lessons in life are provided by the school of hard knocks and last but not least, "you die your business".

Without the lessons provided by LKY in my formative years, I might well of ended up as one of the bleating socialists that have infested Singapore society with their hair brained ideas about equality. I would also have ended up a lot more dependent on the charity of others instead of being able to stand on my own two feet.

 

[brocoli]

While it may not be the government's job to provide a parenting or coaching service, I have to say that the person who has influenced my life more than any other is none other than the great LKY.

His wisdom has been my guiding light. From him, I learned early in life that there was no such thing as a free lunch, that we determine our own destinies, that competition for resources is fierce and unforgiving and downright dirty, that people aren't born equal, that the best lessons in life are provided by the school of hard knocks and last but not least, "you die your business".

Without the lessons provided by LKY in my formative years, I might well of ended up as one of the bleating socialists that have infested Singapore society with their hair brained ideas about equality. I would also have ended up a lot more dependent on the charity of others instead of being able to stand on my own two feet.

FYI, Goh Meng Seng is 1 of the worst socialists around...you still support him????

 

[Fook Seng]

Teamwork is well and good but as is the case in all teams, there will be the slackers and those who refuse to pull their weight. The larger the team, the more of these sorts of characters there will be.

Running a country requires teamwork too. Each and every citizen has to play their part.

The crux of the issue is this.. do you pander to the worst performing members of the team and try to coax them into lifting their game no matter how reluctant they are to put in an honest day's work for an honest day's pay or do you concentrate your efforts on helping those who are smart, hardworking and resourceful and pull their share of the weight.

In a factory situation, the worst performers will be fired sooner or later. In a country, as you correctly point out, this is not an option. They are part of "family" and you have to live with them for better of for worse. I have no problems with that.

To take the ludicrous concept even further, it is now being suggested that pay levels of important jobs be determined by the income levels of the losers of society.

Whether you are a winner or a loser, it is determined by the rules of the game set by the rulers. Very often it is like a casino where luck is a big factor. If you meet up with a good boss, your capability is fully appreciated. Meet with someone who is jealous of your ability, you could be condemned for life.

Like a casino, there are many types of games. You can play colour in roulette and you are a winner roughly 50% of the time and a loser the other 50. If you play one armed bandit, your chances to win with a limited amount money is very much lower.

The game that is played today in Singapore is like the jackpot machine. Win it, you get the jackpot. Lose it and if you also borrowed money, you will probably end up with the cleaner. What forummers here are asking, as with many citizens out there, people who are in your definition, losers, is to have the game changed to something like playing colours at the roulette.

Back to ministerial salary, I see a table of basic salaries and a system of bonuses with a cap for each. But nowhere is there found a transparent way to determine how much of bonuses will be given to each.

In all modern incentive schemes that reward good performers better than the bad ones, there is also the concept of the average performer. To achieve the maximum incentive, even for all good performers (PAP thinks that their ministers are all automatically top performers even though their previous experience had nothing to do with planning or organisation work or setting policies), there should be a Bell Curve distribution.

A Bell curve should be applied to the bonuses of the ministers with the mid-point of the Bell at 3 months according to GE's review proposal or at 2.5 months according to WP's recommendation. In addition, if you want to reward someone with a high bonus, there should be someone who will take home a low one. In fact there should be a budget on the total ministerial salaries, very much like the COE quota applied to cars. The PAP, very well, knows how to do this.

As more than one forummer have pointed out to some analysis done, if bonuses are applied to the max, the reduction is only around 6 to 7%. If everyone is given this bonus, this whole review will be a sham.

 

[Fook Seng]

Would you want your salary to be linked to this guy?

Well you're on your own. You can count me out.

Don't judge the book by its cover. This guy could very well be the new Steve Jobs.

 

[Fook Seng]

Personally my preference is to model it against the British model where the pegging is done against the civil service benchmark. Both are public service. To retain the best in the civil service, the salary is periodically adjusted against the general income of the general public.The mean income however is gaining currency as it will help close the gap in the gini coefficient score.

As long as the best of the civil service is benchmark against either the mean or median income of the working population, I too can accept the British model. But left alone, that one salary point of the civil service salary scheme can be manipulated.

 

[Windsor]

Whether you are a winner or a loser, it is determined by the rules of the game set by the rulers. .........................

If everyone is given this bonus, this whole review will be a sham.

That is so much better bro.

 

[Goh Meng Seng]

Pegging to the 1000 private top earners or the civil servants are basically the same in Singapore's context BUT with one major flaw in the later one.

The senior civil servants' pay is also pegged to the top earners in some ways so to "stay competitive". The problem of such pegging is multi-folds. The most obvious problem is the quantum. The least obvious is the relatively much higher growth rate of income for this upper income group as compared to the mid and lower income group. That is why in 2007 there is a major adjustment of salary of 60% for the ministers while the growth of lower income group is basically stagnant.

However, the pegging of the salary to the higher income would at least be "transparent" because there is a transparent objective parameters. The parameters of 1000 top earners cannot be easily manipulated by any ruling party. The same cannot be said of the peg to senior civil servants. The ruling party can have full power and control to manipulate the salary of senior civil servants. By then, because MPs' salary is also peg to that, how many people will be up against such suggestion? There is an obvious conflict of interests here.

Goh Meng Seng

GMS,

Regardless whether they pegged it to the top 1000 private top earners or the civil servants, they can still up their salaries as and when they want it as long as they are in power.

Under current circumstances, if the economy booms in 5 year's time and the top earners are earning twice as much they are earning now, they can happily collect two times more since the agreed formula is to pegged to them. However, do you believe that civil servant will have their salary doubled in the same period?

Both systems are flawed but until a perfect one is found, I prefer the WP's proposal.

 

[Leongsam]

FYI, Goh Meng Seng is 1 of the worst socialists around...you still support him????

I may agree with certain things he says while disagreeing with others. What is your definition of "support"?

 

[brocoli]

Pegging to the 1000 private top earners or the civil servants are basically the same in Singapore's context BUT with one major flaw in the later one.

The senior civil servants' pay is also pegged to the top earners in some ways so to "stay competitive". The problem of such pegging is multi-folds. The most obvious problem is the quantum. The least obvious is the relatively much higher growth rate of income for this upper income group as compared to the mid and lower income group. That is why in 2007 there is a major adjustment of salary of 60% for the ministers while the growth of lower income group is basically stagnant.

However, the pegging of the salary to the higher income would at least be "transparent" because there is a transparent objective parameters. The parameters of 1000 top earners cannot be easily manipulated by any ruling party. The same cannot be said of the peg to senior civil servants. The ruling party can have full power and control to manipulate the salary of senior civil servants. By then, because MPs' salary is also peg to that, how many people will be up against such suggestion? There is an obvious conflict of interests here.

Goh Meng Seng

the idea of pegging to any 1 is flaw


I agree with what some PAP MPs say

1st time around use it as reference ... but subsequently, the pay should not be pegged but reviewed by parliament

 

[brocoli]

I may agree with certain things he says while disagreeing with others. What is your definition of "support"?

pegging to the lowest of the lowest....

 

[Leongsam]

Don't judge the book by its cover. This guy could very well be the new Steve Jobs.

If he is, then good on him. I wish him well as long as I'm not expected to subsidise his current lifestyle. If he ends up producing "insanely great" products, I'll buy them.

 

[kingrant]

Life was simpler and the people infinitely happier. To you, it's a basket case, but it's not. There was running water, electricity etc. The currency was not worthless, unless you meant the Japanese yen. Yea, they wrecked the place after the British. However, the Brits returned and restored the place. How do you think LKY went about canvasing without electricity and water? He ought to thank the Brits for laying down solid foundations on which he could build without reinventing the wheel. Education was already started by the Brits (Stamford Raffles, Francis thomas etc). So was housing under the S.I.T. then we also had CPF created under the watch of the brits. Not the PAP. You call this a basket case? Your good fren LKY was still swigging beer with his Fabian society fuckbuddies.

Don't worry about my existentialist credentials. I have been here I daresay as long as you have.

I don't know when you came into existence but when Singapore was still a British Colony, it looked very much like a basket case through my eyes. Sanitation was non existent. Running water was a luxury. So was electricity. The currency was worthless. Roads in the outlying areas were nothing more than m&d tracks which were unusable when it rained.

You seem to have this vision that old Singapore that is so far removed from reality that it defies belief.

 

[kingrant]

Let's look at it this way.

The PAP has had their way all these years enriching themselves under the existing formula. If the price of a widget reflects its true value, then we should be getting top of the first world country performance galore. But what do we get?

We had to pay $10 for shitty $1.50 chye tow kuey. That's the issue.

What we have here is a bunch of airheads who actually believe that the remuneration for an important job like running the country should be determined based on the income levels of a bunch of lazy, unmotivated layabouts unable or unwilling to pull their weight like the rest of the productive members of society.

However, I do not for one moment believe that when it comes to their own salaries, they'd be willing to practise what they preach. All they're doing is grandstanding in order to be in sync with the prevailing mood. If I'm wrong on this count, step up and say so. Tell me that in whatever job you're holding now, you have no problems having your pay determined by the income level of the idiots in your organisation.