What is worth living for?

‘Fun City it isn’t. U.S. pollster Gallup conducts surveys in over 140 countries to compare how people feel about their lives. Singapore ranks as the most emotionless society in the world, behind Georgia, Lithuania, and Russia. Singaporeans are unlikely to report feelings of anger, physical pain, or other negative emotions. They’re not laughing a lot, either. “If you measure Singapore by the traditional indicators, they look like one of the best-run countries in the world,” says Jon Clifton, a Gallup partner in Washington. “But if you look at everything that makes life worth living, they’re not doing so well.”’

The above is a report by the Gallup Poll with comments that there is something really missing here. It is akin to what George Yeo said, ‘Everything looks so perfect…but it is not real.’ The comment by Jon Clifton, ‘…what makes life worth living, they’re not doing so well.’ Now is this serious?

The Sinkies are so happy watching how much their properties are worth as the prices keep going up, and smiling everyday, congratulating themselves that they are becoming millionaires without having to work for it. Isn’t that worth living for?

The Sinkies are driving the finest and most expensive cars in the world. This must be something to be proud of and to live for. One may include the milion and multi million dollar properties and the million dollar views these properties came with. The sights from the balconies are definitely worth living for.

And we have the best education for our children with many scoring straight As until the parents are too shy to talk about. Now the ministry also agrees and will not talk about them. Now what else to live for? Oh yes, we have the best and most expensive govt to live for don’t we? A caring and compassionate govt that will take care of every needs of the Sinkies, from cradle to grave, including the Sinkies’ savings. Sinkies will know that they will all live well and with a lot of money left when they depart from this worth. And at the slightest stir, the govt will quickly jump in to offer help and more schemes and solutions.

There are many more things worth living for, the fantasy land in Orchard Road, Avatar Gardens, beautiful buildings, all glittering in the night sky.

The Gallup Poll is wrong for not being able to see all these.

Ostrich School in Problem Solving

The latest acquisition to the Animal Farm is the ostrich, famous for problem solving skill that the kangaroos, doggies, cows and horses were found to be wanting. This ostrich problem skill is world renowned. It can make all problems vanished instantly…by burying its head in the ground. Unable to see the problems means the problems are no longer there. Problem solved.

Let me try to apply this method to the current PSLE angst of the parents and children and maybe help them to solve all their stress problems. Indirectly it will also help to relieve the problems of those in the MOE and in the govt, without the parents bugging them everyday.

Like all problem solving methodology, the first thing to do is to identify the problems. In this case, the problems are caused by the following.

1. Glorifying the high achievers

2. Creating elite schools

3. Creating elitist Through Stream Process

4. Creating elitist grading system

I believe there are many other sources and causes of stress to the parents and children. Let’s just limit to these 4 to demonstrate how effective the Ostrich Problem Solving Methodology will work.

The authorities should stop reporting and glorifying top students and those that did well in the examinations, starting with PSLE. When parents cannot compare how badly their children have fared in the examination, the stress is no longer there. See, very effective. The problem is gone.

Elite schools with their elitist names is another sore point. Raffles Institution, Hwa Chong Institution! Why is my neighbourhood school named Telok Blangah Secondary School when others are called institutions and with great names attached to them. Easy to deal with this problem. All the schools should now be named after the streets or roads nearby. Raffles should all be called Bishan Primary, Bishan Secondary and Bishan High. Hwa Chong will be renamed Bukit Timah Primary, Bukit Timah Secondary and Bukit Timah High. See, the elitist tag is removed instantly and all the schools now look the same or at least sound the same. This is like leveling the playing field.

The third problem, Through Stream. This is even easier to solve. All students entering a primary school will continue with the same secondary school and proceed to the same high school, eg, Jurong Primary to Jurong Secondary and then to Jurong High. It is a Through Stream, from Primary One to A level. It also saves a lot of hassles and administrative problems.

Finally the elitist grades. All schools are good schools, so all schools shall produce good and excellent students. For this to be believeable, all the students shall receive an excellent grade on completion of the schooling system. The grades to be adopted can be like these, Excellent in Sports, Excellent in Technical, Excellent in Arts, Excellent in Domestic Science, Excellent in Academics. All the students will be very happy, and so will be their parents.

See how effective and easy it is to apply the Ostrich Problem Solving Method to solve such a huge problem that cannot be resolved after so many years. Now no one can see which school is good, which student is good, everything looks the same. A uniform education system when every school looks the same and every student also looks the same. Wait a minute, all the school uniforms must be the same also. Can adopt the Maoist style, dull grey, same dull cuts and with no character. Everyone can blend in and not be noticeable. Very egalitarian. Can send the students to the country side to do farming, very holistic also.

Wow, I am a genius. I am going to write a book on this topic and put it in the Fiction Corner of the Library.

Rise of Japanese militarism and the Evil Empire

The Emperor of the Evil Empire has descended on Phnom Penh and war cries were heard. With Obama strutting into the Asean Summit, Japan and the Phillipines were emboldened to challenge China in their claims on the disputed islands. Even Aquino was so brave to shout at the meeting about defending Filipino territories. And Noda finally removed his veil of being a moderate and took the stance of the right wing militants.

The full coterie of the Evil Empire chieftains in the Summit must be reassuring and a show of force to put down China. And this kind of militant gesturing can only get worst by the days with the USA gaming on its pivot to Asia doctrine. Let’s see if Hillary’s call to use trade to win friends will happen, or use arms to force obedience prevails. It is as good as saying we are here to stay and to call the shot. Obama has already told Myanmar to cut ties with North Korea and Cambodia to release political prisoners and meddling with its human right issue.

China better be strong and not allow Japan to push it around. It must be ready to engage the Japanese militarily at Diaoyu Islands. This is the only way to tell the little pests on the by line to stay clear as China means business and would not be pushed around. As for the Phillipines, China should scale down its trade, stop buying bananas and other crops from the Phillipines. Let the Phillipines sell everything to Japan and the USA.

China is in a now or never situation with the Evil Empire and the little pests standing on its head shouting threats of violence. It has to take them down one at a time and test the resolve of the Emperor to show its hands.

Pay and you will get the answers

MAS is keen to know why some goods sold here are more expensive than in other countries or why the prices were different. A tender has been called to conduct a study on the causes. I think they roughly know that some of the factors could be labour, rent, tax, regulations, cost of living, markups, advertising, preference, the weather, hype, consumer irrationality, cost of govt, profiteering, no choice, monopoly, affordability etc etc. The affordability factor is unique to Sin as it means that the seller can sell at any price as long as the consumer has the money and willing to pay, or has no choice but to pay.

Paying for this survey will come up with a clear picture of the whats and the whys of expensive things. Hopefully it will be used to bring down prices so that things that are expensive for rubbish or wrong reasons can be made cheaper. But this is conditional on the caveat that the affordable logic is not used.

I think this will also be useful to me to know how to price my red bean soup too. Then I will know why my red bean soup is more expensive here than in Batam and JB. And for sure I will not price my red bean soup using the affordable logic as I cannot control the supply and demand.

And definitely the survey will help Boon Wan to price his HDB flats. At least he would know why the public flats here are more expensive than in other countries, if he still didn’t get it, and maybe he could then price the flats correctly, and be more affordable. Oops, don’t use the term affordable or the affordability logic can?

I strongly recommend that the Housing Minister also call for a tender to survey why housing prices are so high here. Tenders are useful instruments when conducted properly and the results would be objective and beneficial to who ever commission it.

High Speed trading ‘risky and unfair’ by AFP

This is the title of an article written by Agence France Presse a couple of months back. The gist of the article was about American finance experts raising the dangers and risks of high speed trading in Congress and warning of the consequences. They were all crying foul about how dangerous this animal is and that it must be put down. What they failed miserably to say was that this is cheating and an offence against trading rules and by laws, and against the principles of fair play, a level playing field that all regulators are expected to enforce to protect the traditional and retail investors.

‘”US equity markets are in dire straits. We are truly in a crisis,” said Mr David Lauer, a former trader and now a consultant on markets and high frequency trading at Better Markets ….High frequency trading now accounts for 50% to 70% of the volume on markets each day…But it simultaneously works in “dark pool” trading operations away from regulated markets, with computers able to work at hyper speed to exploit price anomalies and take advantage of buyers and sellers trading in traditional ways.’

This was what Lauer said to the Senate Committee on Banking. He was simply saying that the regulators of the exchange were working hand in glove with the high speed traders using computers, dark pools and tweaking the trading system, to cheat on the traditional traders. To put it even simpler, the regulators are part of the crime syndicate that were exploiting the trading system to cheat the traditional traders and getting away with it with the US Govt either sleeping or closing an eye to their crimes.

‘The effect is that traditional retail investors have pulled out, frightened by the volatility brought by HFT and the perception of unfair pricing…Mr Andrew Brooks of brokerage T. Rowe Price told senators “the almost myopic quest for speed has threatened the very market itself. There is a growing distrust of the casino like environment that the market place has developed over the past decade. We worry that the erosion of investor confidence can undermine our capital markets, which are so important to the economy.”’

Unfortunately all these efforts were in vain as Congress was a lame duck as many congressmen have vested interested to allow the cheating and crime to continue. Some could have participated in the crime themselves. The traditional investors would continue to be cheated and the stock market will continue to wind down to a stand still in time to come. By the end of the day when it becomes unbearable, it would be too late. And the criminals would have walked away with their loot, with the blessing of the US Govt and the appointed regulators to keep watch on the cheats. Who is there to watch over the regulators who became partners of the crime?

Is our market going to suffer the same fate? Are there any similarities?

What is this nonsense called unfair trading? There is no such thing as unfair trading in the stock market. Unfair trading is cheating and is an offence. Even keying in and withdrawal of orders with no genuine intent is an offence to create a false market. Buying and selling without change of ownership is also an offence. Are the computer traders doing this while churning the market and creating a false market? Are they allowed to do this? Anyone with a little privy to price sensitive information and traded on it is committing an offence for insider trading. And high speed trading is doing exactly this, with access to the stock market computer to have privy of orders and to exploit this to an advantage cannot be allowed but is allowed and accepted by the regulators as innocent as a little child.



When would the Americans call a spade a spade that HFT and computer trading are cheating and be made an offence? This is American nonsense at the highest level, allowing the computer traders to cheat on the innocent traditional retail investors. If the American Govt is not going to haul in the offenders, they will pay a very high price eventually with the collapse of the stock market and the end of NYSE.



The Americans must learn from SGX, to ban HFT and computer trading from the market, to protect the interests of traditional retail investors and the capital market. Unfair practices and cheating will never be allowed in SGX. That is why our market is so sound and solid as a rock, with trading volumes increasing and growing.