8/06/2009

What is Seagate saying?

2000 jobs gone and company relocating to cheaper place. Are we expensive? What is making us expensive? Labour cost, land cost, infrastructure cost, govt cost, and whatever cost, are all going up, which is good. Then we can be in the league of the first world cities, notable for being expensive. But one of these costs can and will surely go down if we are to remain at least competitive to keep some manufacturers here. Or maybe manufacturing is already a gone case and service is what is the next biggest employer. We need to thank the two IRs for the job opportunities available. Hey wait a minute, the problem is still there. What problem? Labour cost still must come down, which means the income of the workers is not going to go up by any measures. Ok, where is the problem? With a stagnating income, who is going to pay for the services and goods with escalating prices? Housing, transportation, medical, food and entertainment will only get more expensive because the demand is there. How come, when our workers are not creating the demand? That is beside the point. Our workers will just have to live with the situation, lower income and higher living cost. But don’t worry, housing, go for smaller units or rentals. Food, go for cheaper substitution, don’t each chicken, eat fish, I mean ikan bilis, not pompret or groupers. Actually the real situation is that life is good. People are all very rich and with big disposable income. Just walk to the big shopping centres in Orchard Rd and you will know what I mean. And the long queues of people in private property launches will tell a happy story. What is real and what is make belief? I think the buying frenzies in Orchard Rd and property launches are real.

17 comments:

Wally Buffet said...

I am actually surprised that Seagate took such a long time to go. The others have already left "aeons" ago.First, the pig farms and the vege plots went. Now the factories. We need more land to house the 8 to 10 million. This will be a home to international entrepreneurs and celebs. This is going to be a playground with the IRs and the Grand Prix. This is the hub for conventions, meetings and exhibitions. This is the new research lab for wondrous medicine to counter the emerging virii strains, although I've yet to see a vaccine produced here for the H1N1. This is a centre for knowledge based activities from countering terrorism to disseminating the fine art of female aesthetics and to research on water purification, the key to Man's survival on this crowded planet.

What's a hard disk? In fact, it's going the way of the dodo. The new storage media is SSSM, solid state storage media.

Anonymous said...

We did and do have supertalents that conjure and make dreams that SIN could be the MAGICLAND where all the highest technologies/sciences and industries will be. But, they forgot that the country, they themselves and their citizens are not up to such an aspiration. Otherwise, SIN would not have to import Foreign Talents. A fly can only imagine to be an eagle, but never an eagle.

I did wish that our leaders are more humble and down to earth, but, they are simply too conceited and wild in their ambitions. And may I admit that the Leaders did succeed in convincing many Singaporeans of their capabilities.
Over 66 percent of Singaporeans showed their confidences in the Leadership at the Last Count.

SIN will not be a Dodo though as it does make a good hotel and safe haven for the filthy rich foreigners. Singaporeans will serve these people in hospitalities and vices. Will still survive lah, so to say if Singaporeans can and are willing to serve their Foreigner Masters

patriot

Jaunty Jabber said...

If the educational system in SIngapore is said to be top-class, then why didn't the system produce sufficient talent?

When foreign talents are more valued and thinking skills from foreign minds are more creative, does it says that the educational systems in the foreign lands are more beneficial to the humankind?

We want to be educated to learn how to use our natural abilities that we are born with to the utmost. Not limiting to turn human into wooden logs.

Wally Buffet said...

Better for Singaporeans to serve "filthy rich foreigners" in hospitality and professional services than to bend over a bench churning out hard disks. In any case, vice services have already been outsourced to the PRC who are sending planeloads of fresh chicken here every week.

In a globalized village, cross cultivation of talents and the exchange of ideas is the way to go. Even China is opening up with universities like Beijing, Fudan and Tsinghua encouraging bilateral exchanges of talents.

If you want to be an ostrich, go to the savannas of Africa.

Jaunty Jabber said...

Who is the ostrich that Wally is referring to?

I saw name calling.
I also saw ungracious people.

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

hi wally, while you are being intoxicated by your lijiang air, let me wake you up a bit with some horse urine.

now take a deep breath. feel better, head clearer? what is going to happen, service or manufacturing, is that the worker's pay is not going to go up to remain competitive. but with everything going up, the workers are going to be stretched like a human torso by four horses.

get it my dear emperor? : )

Wally Buffet said...

Matilah and I have always been breathing in your famous prescribed horse urine and our views are straight from our b*lls and not designed to sound nice with all the bells and whistles. We, or at least I, do not pander to swooning, wandering and wondering crows pecking at your daily morsels of wisdom.

All this talk about costs and non competitiveness really riles my old but still agile mind. If, as you say, the situation is dire or going to be, please explain all the crowd that I see sauntering up and down Orchard Road and the crowds queuing overnight for a bite at the condo cherry. Not to mention that every other car you see on the road is brand new. You talk endlessly about the plight of this or that. If you can do better,put your money where your mouth is, go stand for election and test the system or for quick action, stand on a soap box in Speakers' Corner and rant audibly. People like us who stay in 3 room flats and who are equally affected by all you describe take our hardships stoically and try our best to make do with what we have contentedly without diatribe and recriminative whining day in day out.

Geddit? Hehe. Sorry hor, got to get it off my old hairy wrinkled chest!

Wally Buffet said...

This must be getting to be bird country. I saw not only ostriches but chickens pecking around tasty wormy morsels.

ROFL. Heheee.

Jaunty Jabber said...

Maybe, all are dead except the one and only Emperor Wally. No one's live is worth living on except that Wally's one.

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

hi wally, nice that you got it off your hairy chest. this is what a chat room or blog is all about. just let it off.

i posted on the two extreme conditions here, the happy people and the unhappy people, the super rich and the super poor. the happy 3 roomers and the unhappy 3 roomers. and there are the not so rich 5 roomers and the very rich 1 roomer.

it is thus very unfair if we are to speak as if the society is homogenous. it is not. not everyone is at the same comfort level. and not every hardlanders at the lowest level are unhappy. happiness and being contented are personal choices. like matilah said, no one can make you unhappy except yourself. or did he said this.

what is my point? oh, no one should make sweeping statements about a state of affair to apply to all beans. and criticism of one aspect of society, govt or policy is not running down the whole govt or all its policies.

i think this is simple enough to understand huh? agree? unless of course we are living in a real paradise when everything is perfect, beyond reproach, the best that is.

Wally Buffet said...

Hehe, this sounds more like it. As Spock would have said, "It's logical!".

We may not be living in an idyllic paradise, but this is as close as you can get in this corner of the croc infested jungle.

Trust me, I've been around a lot and when you understand what I've seen, I know that we 3 roomers are much much better off than lots of really lost and perplexed citizens around the region.

The trouble with the net citizenry here is that they don't walk the talk or write and practise what they preach. Totally antithesis. Actually, a bunch of hypocrites in the guise of self righteous fakery. Do or say one thing but in actuality doing something else when the chips are down.

Despite what they profess, all Man and for that matter all Woman, think and act the same where race and self interests are concerned. To say otherwise is just pandering to the audience and hitching a ride on an ego trip.

Ⓜatilah $ingapura⚠️ said...

Alamak redbean... let the buggers allocate their capital wherever they like lah.

If they move to a 'cheaper' place, so what? Those poor folks now have a large capital investment in their community, hi tech jobs, training, perks etc. These folks are getting out of poverty, thanks to a multinational industrialist.

Singaporeans — like redbean — should consider complaining less about what 'other people' have.

Jaunty Jabber said...

I enjoy reading alternative views and insight into issues. To me, it is a total nature for people to have remonstrance, owning a blog gets a chance to open it up to the others. I appreciate nature.

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

hi wally, your presence has made this blog more balance. we need opposing views to challenge each other, the contented against the unhappy. and we need more happy people to voice their happiness here. you are all invited to have your say.

matilah, i think everyone is surprised that seagate is still here when the rest has left. the cost here is no longer cheap. we are upgrading and our labour will all become researchers and analyst grade as we move up the ladder of a knowledge economy. perhaps with a PhD behind our names.

the cleaners will soon be able to take statistics and do research on their own to improve the environment, and their income as well. and our croupiers or waiters and waitresses in the IRs will be called differently, say, financial gaming analysts, personal assistants to house guests, etc and the pay will be much higher too.

Wally Buffet said...

Hehe,

Sometimes you are humourously, irritatingly interesting. The ranters and whiners on the net will be called "rantwhiners" in future.

Ⓜatilah $ingapura⚠️ said...

redbean, I am surprised to know that seagate is still in business given the shit drives thay make. I stopped using their rubbish about 3 years ago. All my seagate drives (every single one) has crapped itself. This is what happens when govt is involved in companies -- the ones that should fail are propped up -- 'bailed out'. But maybe I'm expecting too much. These days govt is expected to bail out everyone.

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

no lah, seagate is a private MNC. not govt linked company lah.