TR EMERITUS

According to a table presented by Channel News Asia titled, Medishield Life – Monthly Premiums (2019), Singaporeans are classified under four categories by income. These are Low Income for those earning $1,100 and below, Lower Middle Income, $1,101 to $1,800, Upper Middle Income, $1,801 to $2,600 and Upper Income for those earning above $2,600. The table is based on per capita income and very likely to assume that each household has two working adults or two incomes. It is very generous and a compliment to claim a household income of $5,200 as belonging to Upper Middle Income. At $5,200, many are struggling to own a car or to live comfortably if they have two school going children, and hopefully don’t have parents to look after. For a household with only one income, a $2,000 household income is barely above subsistence level or just above the poverty line for a family of four. To make the classification less realistic, put them in comparative terms like poor, average, rich and very rich. I don’t think anyone will agree that a household income of $3,600 to $5,200 can be considered as rich. So is a household income of more than $5,200 as very rich, Upper Class. Ok, Upper Income is not necessarily upper class. I am wondering what they have in mind or which country’s standard of living are they referring to. It cannot be for Singapore to call someone as very rich or Upper Class/Income if the household income is a paltry $5,200. A $5,200 household income of four is the new poor in this super expensive island. What do you think?   Chua Chin Leng aka redbean * The writer blogs at http://mysingaporenew.blogspot.com    Read More →

(29 Jun) - An organization representing the world’s main central banks warned on Sunday that dangerous new asset bubbles were forming even before the global economy has finished recovering from the last round of financial excess. Investors, desperate to earn returns when official interest rates are at or near record lows, have been driving up the prices of stocks and other assets with little regard for risk, the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, said in its annual report published on Sunday. Recovery from the financial crisis that began in 2007 could take several more years, Jaime Caruana, the general manager of the B.I.S., said at the organization’s annual meeting in Basel on Sunday. The recovery could be especially slow in Europe, he said, because debt levels remain high. “During the boom, resources were misallocated on a huge scale,” Mr. Caruana said, according to a text of his speech, “and it will take time to move them to new and more productive uses.” The B.I.S. provides financial services to national central banks and also acts as a setting where central bankers can discuss monetary policy and other issues like financial stability or bank regulation. The board of directors includes Janet L. Yellen, chairwoman of the Federal Reserve; Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank; and the heads of central banks from Japan, China, India and many other countries. The organization, which reflects a widespread view among central bankers that they are bearing more than their share of the burden of fixing the global economy, often uses its annual reports to send a message to political leaders, commercial bankers and investors. But the B.I.S.’s language in the 2014 edition was unusually direct, as was its warning that the world could be hurtling toward a new crisis. “There is a disappointing element of déjà vu in all this,” Claudio Borio, head of the monetary and economic department at the B.I.S., said in an interview ahead of Sunday’s release of the report. He described the report “as a call to action.”   More in: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/30/business/international/central-bankers-issue-strong-warning-on-asset-bubbles.html?_r=0    Read More →

We refer to the articles “New fund to help needy buy milk for young children” and “WP sets up fund for social causes” (Straits Times, Jun 2). A new “milk powder” fund? The former states that “Low-income families with infants and toddlers who live in the Central Singapore District can tap a new fund to pay for milk powder. The Central Singapore Community Development Council (CDC) has set aside an initial sum of $100,000 for the Formula to Grow Fund. The cost of milk powder has risen over the years, the council noted. This has affected low-income families with young children, especially those who require special milk formula due to medical conditions. The fund is an early childhood intervention programme to provide underprivileged children with a chance to maximise their development potential, she said. For a start, about 60 infants and toddlers will benefit. Members of the public who wish to contribute to the fund may contact the CDC at [email protected]. Families who wish to get help may approach any family service centre in the Central Singapore District.” Inadequate current assistance? Does this new initiative indicate that the existing financial assistance under ComCare may be so grossly inadequate that even babies were being under-nourished? Other poor babies? What about the poor babies in the other constituencies that do not have this “milk powder” fund? Why did it take so long? Why does Singapore – arguably one of the richest countries in the world take so long to take this important step to help poor babies, and albeit in just one CDC? “Goodies to win votes”? Don’t you find it somewhat ironic that on the same day, we had the remarks “Politicians who give “goodies” away to win votes, with little thought of how they would pay for such goodies, risk not only insolvency, but turning citizens cynical against politics, National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan said on Monday. “Political cynicism”? “Democracy of that manner must lead to insolvency and eventually political cynicism,” he said, underscoring an important principle the Government held to even as it tried to make Singapore cleaner, greener and more comfortable for all. “Paradise on earth”? When Singapore’s ambassador-at-large Tommy Koh, the discussion’[s moderator, asked Mr Khaw what he thought of the view that Singapore was paradise on Earth, the minister said: “As a government, we take a more practical approach; we dare not promise paradise. “An enduring home” without adequate “milk powder”? “We try to make Singapore an enduring home for all Singaporeans”? (“Promising goodies to win votes not the way to go: Khaw“, Straits Times, Jun 2). “No child will be left behind” is not a “promise”? So, Singapore, the so called “paradise on earth” in Ambassador Tommy Koh’s question – is only now in a sense making good on the repeated promises over the years that no child will be left behind because they are poor – by providing so basic a need as adequate milk powder? WP also gets into the act? As to “The Workers’ Party (WP) has set up a charity fund to run community programmes like financial aid, food distribution and health screenings. The WP Community Fund (WPCF) is structured like the PAP Community Foundation (PCF), the ruling party’s charity arm” Politicising of welfare? Is it a healthy development for our so called “constructive politics” to in a way be evolving into the politicising of welfare for the needy, when we had a $36.1 billion Budget surplus in FY2012 according to the Department of Statistics, using IMF fiscal reporting guidelines? $36.1b surplus, yet spend so little on needy? We have so much surpluses and yet we spend so little on the needy that they have to depend on which constituency they live in and under what party, to determine what and how much help they can get? A sad day indeed for Singapore’s “constructive politics”! Uniquely Singapore!   SY Lee and Leong Sze Hian    Read More →