Honestly, How much credit should be Given to LKY to Singapore's success story?

[psy83]

I have been hearing this over and over and over and over again!!! Without lky this country would still be a "Fishing village"..Ok we all know that way before the old fart and PAP came into existent this country was already a success story.

So what are the honest credits that should be given to this Lawyer cum Politician?

Our economy success should be credited to Albert Winsemius, The Brits, PAP/LKY?

Who is responsible to Singapore being Singapore today(Every aspect of Singapore/Singaporean Life exclude Economics)

Which year was Singapore considered a Developed/1st world country?

What is the Situation now? What is the Future situation of Singapore and Singaporean in terms of Way of life/Standard of living.

 

[wMulew]

Simple answer to your simple question yes he deserve the credit.

Yes Albert Winsemius but at the end of the day it was up to the leader of the country whether to go with the model. Albert's model was one that was ultimately used but are you certain he's model was the only one proposed. And less we forget, we've already moved away from his original model a long time back.

The leader of any organization isn't the one who comes up with plans to move the organization forward. They are the ones who comes up with a direction as to how the organization should move. As to how the org actually gets there is planned by the pple below him, the engineers, the arthtects, the Finance pple, etc.

It is up the person at the top to employ the right pple capable of doing whatever needs to be done and to make a high level decision on how it should be done leaving the details to the lower ranks. E.g. look at Microsoft, Steve Ballmer or Bill Gates are not the ones programming the current version of Windows or MS Office.

 

[nonsense]

ask those clowns in my signature..............................

 

[steffychun]

It's taken up already by Westerrn and non-Western authors/academics

 

[freedalas]

Simple answer to your simple question yes he deserve the credit.

Yes Albert Winsemius but at the end of the day it was up to the leader of the country whether to go with the model. Albert's model was one that was ultimately used but are you certain he's model was the only one proposed. And less we forget, we've already moved away from his original model a long time back.

The leader of any organization isn't the one who comes up with plans to move the organization forward. They are the ones who comes up with a direction as to how the organization should move. As to how the org actually gets there is planned by the pple below him, the engineers, the arthtects, the Finance pple, etc.

It is up the person at the top to employ the right pple capable of doing whatever needs to be done and to make a high level decision on how it should be done leaving the details to the lower ranks. E.g. look at Microsoft, Steve Ballmer or Bill Gates are not the ones programming the current version of Windows or MS Office.

Well, what's sauce for the gander is sauce for the goose. If LKY wants to claim all the credit for successes, then he must also shoulder the blame for all the failures eg FT policy, over-priced HDB Flats, packed like sardines MRT, the inexcusable flooding in Orchard Rd and elsewhere,retaining our CPF till we're almost dead, unaffordable health care.

The problem is PAP has long claimed credit for everything that went well but not those that did not. Good example is the economy. When the economy is in positive territory, LKY will claim it's due to their foresightedness, preparedness and all that bullshit. But when the economy is negative, he will say it's due to the global situation which we can't avoid. In reality, our economy is simply dependent what's happening elsewhere particularly the US. If US booms, we boom. If US is down, we're down. Simple as that. It has nothing to do with the PAP. In fact, some may even argue that due to the flawed PAP policies, we ought to have done better when the chips in US are up, and ought not to have done so badly when the chips in US are down. LKY has over the past 5 decades created the myth that everything good is due to him so much so that people just sub-consciously (or perhaps unconsciously) attribute it to him.

 

[wMulew]

Your argument would hold except for the fact that
1)SG economic growth have consistently outgrow the US
2)SG during recession never get hit as bad as the US
3)And more recently SG was one of the first to recover from the global economic crisis while US still have not.
We are an export and trade oriented market. Due to the small domestic market, most of our income comes from Outside. If they are not doing well there is no way we can be doing well. Yet when the rest of the world is doing well, our economy kept pace and in most cases outgrewth global economy. Something that almost not many if any 1st world economy have managed to do. Isn't that in itself an achievement? And less we forget, our unemployment rate at the height of the 08/09 crisis stood at <5%. Something that most developed countries hopes to achieve in a good year

 

[greedy and cunning]

errr , me think credit should go to all the past and present leaders of the neighbouring countries.
if not for their own greed , selfishness , and incompetent , whatever we did we would not
be so successful.

 

[red amoeba]

Your argument would hold except for the fact that
1)SG economic growth have consistently outgrow the US
2)SG during recession never get hit as bad as the US
3)And more recently SG was one of the first to recover from the global economic crisis while US still have not.
We are an export and trade oriented market. Due to the small domestic market, most of our income comes from Outside. If they are not doing well there is no way we can be doing well. Yet when the rest of the world is doing well, our economy kept pace and in most cases outgrewth global economy. Something that almost not many if any 1st world economy have managed to do. Isn't that in itself an achievement? And less we forget, our unemployment rate at the height of the 08/09 crisis stood at <5%. Something that most developed countries hopes to achieve in a good year

our growth comes at the expense of lower wages....vis-a-vis countries with similar cost of living

the thing is that..why are we structuring our economy to be export oriented + US / EUR oriented?

US export creativity byproducts -eg: ipod, ipad, cultural by-product eg: coke, hollywood. Wpns (which is R&D by product).

ok, their economy is shit - becos of long-term overspending, and they are doing that since Washington is the president. They ain't gonna change and the whole world is dancing with them.

If PAP gahmen is indeed the world-class leadership, they ought to chart something to break out this "yoke" instead of shrugging their shoulders and say, oops...EUR / US is in doldrums so, expect hard times ahead...

they need to seriously remodel the education model to start with.

 

[wMulew]

You sound like the economic model have never changed.

SG Pre independence = Trading Port
Immediate Post Independence = Manufacturing
After that = Financial Services
And then = Aviation Hub
A bit later = IT
A short while back = Biotech
More recently = Toursit and Gaming(IR)

Can't blame them for the lack of trying. The fact is simple, unlike China or US where they have a huge domestic market or in the case of Japan, jack the price up at an insanely high price for their own markets, we will always have to depend on others if we are to at least sustain the currently standard of living. There is no escaping this. Even if we invent the next IPod or create the next Facebook, at the end of the day the economy will still always be dependent on global financial simply due to the domestic market size and given today's globalized world.

 

[neddy]

You sound like the economic model have never changed.


Can't blame them for the lack of trying. The fact is simple, unlike China or US where they have a huge domestic market or in the case of Japan, jack the price up at an insanely high price for their own markets, we will always have to depend on others if we are to at least sustain the currently standard of living. There is no escaping this. Even if we invent the next IPod or create the next Facebook, at the end of the day the economy will still always be dependent on global financial simply due to the domestic market size and given today's globalized world.

Instead of jacking up price, reduce cost through cheap foreign labour.
Small countries just need to nibble at the juicy edges of other people's pie.

It is true that if you want to consume more than what the country is able to produce, you depend on others. In Singapore's case, it is lucky that the region is poorer and not as organised.

Globalisation has help Singapore, not hinder. If every continent returns to its protectionist bloc, Singapore will be worse off.

 

[Liquigas]

How come in spite of our economy growing faster than US economy during good years and able to recover faster than US during lean times, our general wage level has remained stagnant for two decades? In 1991, a fresh poly graduate could earn $1,500 pm, today he or she is likely to earn no more than $1,800 pm .....

 

[tanwahtiu]

it doesn't matter, the dirts under the carpet are not dig out yet. When the dirts are out the credit rating will drop.

 

[tanwahtiu]

fake GDP, a closed economy all link to GLC and Temasik can bullshit whatever they want.

When Oppo or become coalition party gahment the GDP will drop like shit.

How come in spite of our economy growing faster than US economy during good years and able to recover faster than US during lean times, our general wage level has remained stagnant for two decades? In 1991, a fresh poly graduate could earn $1,500 pm, today he or she is likely to earn no more than $1,800 pm .....

 

[Fook Seng]

You sound like the economic model have never changed.

SG Pre independence = Trading Port
Immediate Post Independence = Manufacturing
After that = Financial Services
And then = Aviation Hub
A bit later = IT
A short while back = Biotech
More recently = Toursit and Gaming(IR)

The world economy is changing all the time. If Singapore has not been changing in its economic composition the govt ought to be kicked in the bum long time ago. Biotech, even Aviation Hibbing and gaming are relatively new industries that others on the region are getting involved in e.g. Electronic manufacturing in Malaysia, tourism in Thailand which was ahead of Singapore until their domestic political problems took over, Macao which has made a beacon for other aspiring economies to follow. In many cases, Singapore was forced into the new areas, because it was being substituted. No choice situation. You want to talk about pure GDP. In the last recession, Singapore was about the only country among the major economies to have gone into negative territory. The stock market also at that time was the worst performing in Asia. You want to compare economic growth, you should compare apple with apple, city with city, not city with a true country with rural as well as a large agricultural sector. Compare with Shenzhen, Shanghai and many cities in China. Even Cebu in the Philippines, not known for a country of rapid growth had registered growth in some years exceeding 20%. So when we boast how strong the Singapore economy has been growing, our neighbours are boiling inside. As someone has posted here, what we have seriously missed out is to find the right balance for our growth where the quality of living is improved throughout the population, not just at the very top.

 

[wMulew]

How come in spite of our economy growing faster than US economy during good years and able to recover faster than US during lean times, our general wage level has remained stagnant for two decades? In 1991, a fresh poly graduate could earn $1,500 pm, today he or she is likely to earn no more than $1,800 pm .....

Where did U get that figure? The Sky?

SG Median Household income in 1990 - $2296 Source
SG Median Household income in 2011 - $5000 source

 

[red amoeba]

Where did U get that figure? The Sky?

SG Median Household income in 1990 - $2296 Source
SG Median Household income in 2011 - $5000 source

on avg of 20 yrs, household income has risen 5.8% per annum.

minus inflation (avg 5%), its only 0.8%.

how much have costs increased over the same period of time?

 

[wMulew]

on avg of 20 yrs, household income has risen 5.8% per annum.

minus inflation (avg 5%), its only 0.8%.

how much have costs increased over the same period of time?

SG inflation History

http://www.singstat.gov.sg/stats/themes/economy/hist/cpi.html

Average over the last 20 years inflation < 3%

And your question sibei funny. Inflation IS cost increase.

The world economy is changing all the time. If Singapore has not been changing in its economic composition the govt ought to be kicked in the bum long time ago. Biotech, even Aviation Hibbing and gaming are relatively new industries that others on the region are getting involved in e.g. Electronic manufacturing in Malaysia, tourism in Thailand which was ahead of Singapore until their domestic political problems took over, Macao which has made a beacon for other aspiring economies to follow. In many cases, Singapore was forced into the new areas, because it was being substituted. No choice situation. You want to talk about pure GDP. In the last recession, Singapore was about the only country among the major economies to have gone into negative territory. The stock market also at that time was the worst performing in Asia. You want to compare economic growth, you should compare apple with apple, city with city, not city with a true country with rural as well as a large agricultural sector. Compare with Shenzhen, Shanghai and many cities in China. Even Cebu in the Philippines, not known for a country of rapid growth had registered growth in some years exceeding 20%. So when we boast how strong the Singapore economy has been growing, our neighbours are boiling inside. As someone has posted here, what we have seriously missed out is to find the right balance for our growth where the quality of living is improved throughout the population, not just at the very top.

The inverse is true. How can you compare a country with no domestic market to speak of to a city which is part of a country with huge domestic markets. If you want to compare the only countries which is even close to SG is Taiwan and HK and even in Taiwan it's an unfar comparison. BTW, the median income of SG beats both Taiwan and HK.

 

[Fook Seng]

SG inflation History

http://www.singstat.gov.sg/stats/themes/economy/hist/cpi.html

Average over the last 20 years inflation < 3%

And your question sibei funny. Inflation IS cost increase.

The inverse is true. How can you compare a country with no domestic market to speak of to a city which is part of a country with huge domestic markets. If you want to compare the only countries which is even close to SG is Taiwan and HK and even in Taiwan it's an unfar comparison. BTW, the median income of SG beats both Taiwan and HK.

Which city counts the domestic market economy of the whole country as the GDP of that city?

 

[Fook Seng]

Can someone tell me how is inflation defined?

 

[greedy and cunning]

SG inflation History

http://www.singstat.gov.sg/stats/themes/economy/hist/cpi.html

Average over the last 20 years inflation < 3%

And your question sibei funny. Inflation IS cost increase.



The inverse is true. How can you compare a country with no domestic market to speak of to a city which is part of a country with huge domestic markets. If you want to compare the only countries which is even close to SG is Taiwan and HK and even in Taiwan it's an unfar comparison. BTW, the median income of SG beats both Taiwan and HK.

how about all these small countries ,Liechtenstein 62 square miles , Monaco 0.7 square miles , San Marino 24 square miles.
all have beri high median income leh.