Posted here for my non-FB friends
I went to search for GDP per capita to compare some oppositions claims about the problem with median wages and ministerial pay. http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&met=ny_gdp_pcap_cd&idim=country%3ASGP&dl=en&hl=en&q=singapore+gdp+per+capita
Source: Worldbank
note: its unadjusted, but after adjusting it is supposedly a 40x increase since 1960.
After doing so, I believe the argument is better made in a total GDP versus a median wage quoting. Other figures quoted during opposition rally include increment of (degree holders') pay by ~37% and lower income group by ~22 percent but increment of HDB flat prices by ~70%, sources unknown and unverified. However logically (by my semi-inaccurate intuition nonetheless) tagging HDB prices to resale flats is prompting a runaway inflation being powered and released like a spring by prospective homeowners and prospectors.
Regarding the foreign presence, I believe all "rich" or "first-world" (fast becoming the dirty catchphrase of the year) countries are facing that problem. I'll quote some figures here:
In 1990: Total: 3m Citizens 2.6m PR 0.1m Non residents 0.3m
2000: T 4m C 3m PR 0.28m NR 0.75m
2009: T 5m C 3.2m PR 0.53m NR 1.25m
%s (rounded)
1990: C 86.7 PR 3 NR 10.2
2000: C 75 PR 7 NR 18.75%
2009: C 64 PR 10.6 NR 25%
Source: Singstat http://www.singstat.gov.sg/pubn/reference/yos10/statsT-demography.pdf
US has ~ 12.5% foreign born (source: US Census Bureauhttp://www.census.gov/prod/2010pubs/acsbr09-15.pdf) . UK has ~11% (source: Telegraph - is this reliable).
Taking this into account, citizens are rapidly becoming closer to 50%. It is an astonishing rate. Ants may keep aphids and symbiotic relationships like the common clownfish-anemone and remorae-shark work on the basis of specialisation, but citizenship of a country should be the majority.
I'm astonished (to use a popular but wrong phrase, I myself am astonished) by the raw figures here, assuming citizens include those born of PRs we are fast becoming the minority.
We have 2.35m voting this year for 5m population
This year, each vote will affect more than 2 human beings' equivalent.
Foreign talent shouldn't be a case of pride or productivity, because either point is difficult to measure, subjective (especially in accusations of nepotism, but that's another story I can expound on). Let's just say for the sake of argument, we play by the government's coherent rules on sound economics and statistics.
SOVEREIGNITY is at stake here. If any GOVERNMENT is blind to this, I shudder to think about the future developments in store.
comments?
Source: Worldbank
note: its unadjusted, but after adjusting it is supposedly a 40x increase since 1960.
After doing so, I believe the argument is better made in a total GDP versus a median wage quoting. Other figures quoted during opposition rally include increment of (degree holders') pay by ~37% and lower income group by ~22 percent but increment of HDB flat prices by ~70%, sources unknown and unverified. However logically (by my semi-inaccurate intuition nonetheless) tagging HDB prices to resale flats is prompting a runaway inflation being powered and released like a spring by prospective homeowners and prospectors.
Regarding the foreign presence, I believe all "rich" or "first-world" (fast becoming the dirty catchphrase of the year) countries are facing that problem. I'll quote some figures here:
In 1990: Total: 3m Citizens 2.6m PR 0.1m Non residents 0.3m
2000: T 4m C 3m PR 0.28m NR 0.75m
2009: T 5m C 3.2m PR 0.53m NR 1.25m
%s (rounded)
1990: C 86.7 PR 3 NR 10.2
2000: C 75 PR 7 NR 18.75%
2009: C 64 PR 10.6 NR 25%
Source: Singstat http://www.singstat.gov.sg/pubn/reference/yos10/statsT-demography.pdf
US has ~ 12.5% foreign born (source: US Census Bureauhttp://www.census.gov/prod/2010pubs/acsbr09-15.pdf) . UK has ~11% (source: Telegraph - is this reliable).
Taking this into account, citizens are rapidly becoming closer to 50%. It is an astonishing rate. Ants may keep aphids and symbiotic relationships like the common clownfish-anemone and remorae-shark work on the basis of specialisation, but citizenship of a country should be the majority.
I'm astonished (to use a popular but wrong phrase, I myself am astonished) by the raw figures here, assuming citizens include those born of PRs we are fast becoming the minority.
We have 2.35m voting this year for 5m population
This year, each vote will affect more than 2 human beings' equivalent.
Foreign talent shouldn't be a case of pride or productivity, because either point is difficult to measure, subjective (especially in accusations of nepotism, but that's another story I can expound on). Let's just say for the sake of argument, we play by the government's coherent rules on sound economics and statistics.
SOVEREIGNITY is at stake here. If any GOVERNMENT is blind to this, I shudder to think about the future developments in store.
comments?