We are all very familiar with so many top surgeons, lawyers and CEOs joining politics and working in a field that their professionally trained skills and expertise were of no specific relevance. We are depriving the industries and people of these talents and putting them in areas that they may not perform at the best of their talents. It is also a great loss of investments in acquiring their skills and expertise. Training someone to reach the peak of their profession only to pull them out to do something that they are not trained to do but assumed to be equally experts.
The other area of increasing concern is to train graduates, with hundreds of thousands being spent in their education, to become taxi drivers. Not that driving taxis is a bad profession. It is just using over qualified people to do a much simpler job. It is definitely a misallocation of talents and resources. The same principle applies to highly qualified graduates not being employed to perform the jobs that they are trained and equipped to do.
The third area is the civil service. Many of our top talents, on paper, are in the civil service. Could they be deployed in more productive areas in the private sector? Agree that successful entrepreneurs do not need academic excellence. But there are many advantages of having academically excellent talents in many fields in the industry that required serious technical knowledge that some entrepreneurs are not armed with.
Are we allocating our precious little super talent pools efficiently?
2/13/2012
America losing credibility and support
Foreign Minister Shanmugam was invited to make a keynote speech in Washington at the Singapore Conference attended by the decision makers of the US. I heard that the Conference was oversubscribed, an honour that is rare for a visitor from Singapore other then Mr Singapore himself. And there in the heart of Washington, Shanmugam went on to warn the Americans of their jingo rhetoric against China and the containment of China. It must be a painful slap to those who paid to listen to this warning. And from Washington Shanmugam flew straight to Beijing to be hosted by the Chinese leaders and pledging to work more closely and to cooperate on international issues. This must be even harder to swallow for the Americans.
Then came the veto by Russia and China against regime change in Syria at the Security Council. And the fuming mad European mafia led by the US is now trying to bypass the UNSC to intervene directly in Syria with the UK saying that it was not bounded by the UNSC decision. The double vetos were a strong statement that the Russians and the Chinese are ganging up to take on the Western powers and would not let them bulldoze their way in Syria.
Coming closely to these developments is the key American agenda of sanctioning Iran. Like a lightning bolt out from the cold and from the most unlikely places, India is not going to go along with the sanction. Instead, the Indians are going it alone to expand trade with Iran. And the comment is that it is a golden opportunity to go in when the West and America have left a vacuum.
The defiance by three big powers from the BRICS group is a turning point in American dominance and dictation of world affairs. And with their strongest and most dependable ally Singapore telling them off on home ground, it is quite clear that the fortune of Pax America is going downhill.
The Americans can shout and scream, but not many will listen anymore. The raising of the profile of emerging powers to put their own national interests first rather than be made to tow the American line must have startled the American decision makers. A new paradigm shift is in the making. The three major Asian powers will have a mind of their own. If Japan and S Korea were to come on board, it will present a very formidable new power centre to challenge the American leadership and the Europeans.
Then came the veto by Russia and China against regime change in Syria at the Security Council. And the fuming mad European mafia led by the US is now trying to bypass the UNSC to intervene directly in Syria with the UK saying that it was not bounded by the UNSC decision. The double vetos were a strong statement that the Russians and the Chinese are ganging up to take on the Western powers and would not let them bulldoze their way in Syria.
Coming closely to these developments is the key American agenda of sanctioning Iran. Like a lightning bolt out from the cold and from the most unlikely places, India is not going to go along with the sanction. Instead, the Indians are going it alone to expand trade with Iran. And the comment is that it is a golden opportunity to go in when the West and America have left a vacuum.
The defiance by three big powers from the BRICS group is a turning point in American dominance and dictation of world affairs. And with their strongest and most dependable ally Singapore telling them off on home ground, it is quite clear that the fortune of Pax America is going downhill.
The Americans can shout and scream, but not many will listen anymore. The raising of the profile of emerging powers to put their own national interests first rather than be made to tow the American line must have startled the American decision makers. A new paradigm shift is in the making. The three major Asian powers will have a mind of their own. If Japan and S Korea were to come on board, it will present a very formidable new power centre to challenge the American leadership and the Europeans.
Act I Scene 2 – More sleaze in Sin City
The Sin City is getting more oomph than is welcomed. The latest news that hit the island is that about 80 people were rounded up by the police for internet prostitution. And among them a principal from a top primary school and several senior civil servants. Not sure if they were patrons, customers or operators.
This episode is more than just personal indiscretion between consenting adults. It is something that infringes on the law of the country. Prostitution is illegal though tolerated to some extent as a necessary evil with so many single foreigners working in the country. In this case the parties are Singaporeans in respectable professions and the education of the young. The latter makes it that more sensational. Of all the professions a school principal of a primary sent discomforting signals to the parents of little children.
Would there be Scene 3 and Scene 4?
This episode is more than just personal indiscretion between consenting adults. It is something that infringes on the law of the country. Prostitution is illegal though tolerated to some extent as a necessary evil with so many single foreigners working in the country. In this case the parties are Singaporeans in respectable professions and the education of the young. The latter makes it that more sensational. Of all the professions a school principal of a primary sent discomforting signals to the parents of little children.
Would there be Scene 3 and Scene 4?
2/12/2012
Employ Singaporeans first
I was at the Speaker’s Corner last evening to listen to Gilbert Goh and his friends from Transitioning.org talking about employing Singaporeans first. He had lined up several speakers to talk about the plight of the jobless and under employed Singaporeans with several graduates sharing their stories with him.
One lost his $7000 job to an EP holder and is now a taxi driver. And other graduate also lost his job and is also a taxi driver. And a Malaysian shared with Gilbert that she is now employed by a foreign bank and her pay is $10k. She has a masters degree. Good for her.
In some of Gilbert’s article in Transitioning.org, he reported about companies where foreigners seemed to be in the majority, with some turned Singaporeans recently. We have also read reports of top jobs in sports and recreation clubs going to foreigners.
There seems to be an unplanned and uncoordinated conspiracy for foreign and local organisations to employ foreigners and leaving Singaporeans to be taxi drivers even if they are graduates of our world class universities. Of course there is a bit of an exaggeration here. Many Singaporeans are employed and many are still unemployed or underemployed. And that is the main reason why Gilbert went to the Speaker’s Corner to make a plea to the govt to do something to ensure that Singaporeans are employed first.
I find the preference by foreign and local organisations to employ foreigners rather than Singaporeans quite intriqueing. What is wrong with Singaporeans graduating from our world class universities? I am very sure that many of the foreigners are graduates of much less reputable universities, and they are not exactly paid lower than Singaporeans.
What is the catch? What is wrong with Singaporeans or why are Singaporeans having relatively more problems getting employed than foreigners? Work attitude, lack drive? Looking at the above two graduates who are prepared to drive taxis, you cannot say they have bad attitudes or lack drives. They are willing to do anything to put rice on the table. And we have the oldies working their guts out, long hours and little pay, in jobs that no Singaporeans would want to do. They can’t be lacking in drive?
Is there something that the govt can do as the caretaker of Singaporeans who were voted into power by Singaporeans to take care of Singaporeans first?
One lost his $7000 job to an EP holder and is now a taxi driver. And other graduate also lost his job and is also a taxi driver. And a Malaysian shared with Gilbert that she is now employed by a foreign bank and her pay is $10k. She has a masters degree. Good for her.
In some of Gilbert’s article in Transitioning.org, he reported about companies where foreigners seemed to be in the majority, with some turned Singaporeans recently. We have also read reports of top jobs in sports and recreation clubs going to foreigners.
There seems to be an unplanned and uncoordinated conspiracy for foreign and local organisations to employ foreigners and leaving Singaporeans to be taxi drivers even if they are graduates of our world class universities. Of course there is a bit of an exaggeration here. Many Singaporeans are employed and many are still unemployed or underemployed. And that is the main reason why Gilbert went to the Speaker’s Corner to make a plea to the govt to do something to ensure that Singaporeans are employed first.
I find the preference by foreign and local organisations to employ foreigners rather than Singaporeans quite intriqueing. What is wrong with Singaporeans graduating from our world class universities? I am very sure that many of the foreigners are graduates of much less reputable universities, and they are not exactly paid lower than Singaporeans.
What is the catch? What is wrong with Singaporeans or why are Singaporeans having relatively more problems getting employed than foreigners? Work attitude, lack drive? Looking at the above two graduates who are prepared to drive taxis, you cannot say they have bad attitudes or lack drives. They are willing to do anything to put rice on the table. And we have the oldies working their guts out, long hours and little pay, in jobs that no Singaporeans would want to do. They can’t be lacking in drive?
Is there something that the govt can do as the caretaker of Singaporeans who were voted into power by Singaporeans to take care of Singaporeans first?
Silvaraju, my friend
On my way to the Raffles Place Station I saw Raju ahead of me. I called out to him and we had a little chat on the stock market before we parted. He was going to The Arcade and I continued to the station. That was Friday, just after office. He was in his cool and quiet manner and asking if the market was kind to me. He missed the rally by getting out too early with small profits.
I saw Raju again this morning in the Sunday Times Obituary page. He passed away peacefully yesterday at the age of 56.
We played golf together. We took turn to drive when we played. His game was improving greatly and his drive with his 3 woods was further than my driver. He was fit as a fiddle, and with no sickness. He is up there now.
Goodbye my friend, my golf kaki. And thanks again for the Chinese New Year greetings.
I saw Raju again this morning in the Sunday Times Obituary page. He passed away peacefully yesterday at the age of 56.
We played golf together. We took turn to drive when we played. His game was improving greatly and his drive with his 3 woods was further than my driver. He was fit as a fiddle, and with no sickness. He is up there now.
Goodbye my friend, my golf kaki. And thanks again for the Chinese New Year greetings.
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