Quality of Singapore University going up

I posted this chart in Mar last year.




 

Universities fees were raised in concert last year. And they are doing it again this year, in concert again. Is there anything wrong when merchants acted together to raise prices, like the price of a cup of kopi in the kopitiams? My apologies, universities are not merchants.
 
This time they cited higher costs of talents, supplies and services and the expectations of students and the fee hikes are to defray these costs. So our students must be the best in the world by now with the frequent hikes to improve the quality of university education. Why are the employers still running to 3rd World countries to employ their talents and our graduates are found to lack the skills and talents needed? Or is it that the quality of our universities has always been sub par and we are still playing catching up with the 3rd World universities?
 
The fee hikes are in the region of 2.6% to 7.9% for NUS, 2.5% to 5% for NTU, 2% for SMU and 4% for SUTD. In monetary terms the increases range from $200, $850 and $1150 in NUS. The increase for PRs and international students will be higher. As an example, in SUTD, Singaporeans will pay 4% more while PRs 12% and international students by 16%. Polytechnic fees also go up with this hike.
 
Singaporeans are so lucky that the universities are upgrading their teaching quality every year with higher fees to buy better talents to teach them. At the rate it is going, all the top academic talents in the world will be bought by our universities and our graduates will be the best in the whole world that money can buy.
 
I only hope that this is true. I only hope that the employers stop rushing to 3rd World countries to employ their graduates and complain that our graduates are not good enough. I hope to see one or two of our local graduates be found fit to be the CEO of a local or foreign bank.
 
What to believe? You tell me lah.

Singapore is the most successful car manufacturer

Singapore manufactures practically every top brand cars in the world, from Rolls Royce, Mercedes, BMWs, Bentley’s, Lamborghinis and Ferraris to all the Japanese and Korean brands. And the profit margin is so high that it is becoming the envy of other car manufacturers. For every Mercedes or BMW sold, what the OEM and distributors earned is a pittance of what the Singapore Govt earned.
 
Now this is productivity Singapore style. We manufactured cars without having to do the difficult and dirty work. And our cost is practically zero with no overheads. Just ask Mercedes and BMW how much they make for each sale and go and find out how much the Singapore Govt makes. It is mind blowing.
 
Singapore is the most successful car manufacturer in the whole world.

Leong Sze Hian’s comments on the Medishield Life

Leong Sze Hian asked several questions on the Medishield Life Scheme following Gan Kim Yong’s comments in Parliament in his article, ‘Alternative daily news(81) Affordable Medishield Life?’ posted in the TRE. His questions would help many to have a better understanding of the things not said about the Scheme and is a compelling read, highly recommended for all Sinkies who are still not aware of what this Scheme is all about and how it would hit them when it comes into force.
 
I would just want to expand on a couple of points made by Sze Hian. He quoted Gan Kim Yong saying these:
 
1. “The premiums that lower- and middle-income households will have to pay for the new Medishield Life insurance that kicks in next year, will be the same or lower than what they now pay. That is after taking into account the Government’s permanent subsidies and Medisave contributions and top-ups.
 
2. “… a typical Singaporean household, comprising a working-age couple with two school-going children, will take up no more than half of their annual Medisave inflow to pay for their MediShield Life premiums.
 
In point 1, the meaning is that the gross premium would be higher but would be offset by permanent subsidies, Medisave contributions and top ups. Gan had said that the net amount to be paid would be the same or lower than what they are paying now. Would this be the same as time goes by? Would the permanent subsidies match any increases in future premiums? Would future premium hikes eat up all future Medisave contributions? Would top ups cease in the future or varies?
 
For the initial stages of the Medishield Life’s implementation, the net premiums paid could be reasonable if they are lower or the same. But there is no guarantee what the amount will be like when the gross premium will definitely be much higher.
 
As for point 2, the base reference is a typical household of two working adults and two children, and the premiums paid will be no more than half their annual Medisave contributions. Sounds fair and good. The problem comes when there is only one working adult. The problem will be further compounded for families with more than two children and only one working adult. For those single parents with 4 or more children, tough, take my word for it.
 
And the most important part that is yet to be made known, what will the Medishield Life cover and what not covered?

Kopi Level - Green

MH370 – Australian sighted debris

The plot thickens

I had this very bad feeling that the two pieces of debris reported by Australia are parts of MH370. I hope they are not as there is no reason for MH370 to be there. The distance is beyond its fuel range even if it was to fly straight through Singapore to the spot. The plane could not fly through Singapore and Indonesia without being picked up on radars. The only way was to fly through the north of Sumatra and that would make the distance even further. It would thus need to make a stopover, refuelled and continued to the location. It definitely could not make it directly. The 12 days could explain this mystery. And very likely no passengers were found among the wreckage.

There would be many questions to be asked as the Antartica was the last place anyone would think the aircraft would be, and why would they want to fly to crash in a remote corner of the deep ocean? The aircraft deliberately evaded all the radar stations and it is simply meaningless to want to do all the manoeuvres only to crash into a corner of the Indian Ocean away from civilisation. And it is also very strange, sheer coincidence that the Australians thought it could be there and found it so quickly.

Then there are questions like why weren’t the black boxes beeping? Given the time lapse, could the aircraft actually be flown somewhere first, got its black boxes stripped, passengers off loaded and then flown there to crash into the ocean? Because of the depth of the ocean at that spot, recovering it would be impossible and would be abandoned. Who would want to do it and pay for it? No one would know that the black boxes were already removed from the aircraft.

For the pilot/crew to fly and ditch the aircraft, they must then be picked up by another aircraft or ship to bring them to safety. After successfully pulling off such a stunt there was no need for them to die there.

The whole episode of the hijack was so meticulously executed and now another piece of well planned evacuation of the pilot/crew that could only be done with great resources. It is not a simple piece of terrorist work. It is a very difficult thing to do to fly from where it disappeared to where the debris appeared, assuming it is the aircraft. The mastermind must have great expertise, technological knowhow, manpower and hardware like ships and aircraft at his disposal to get this job done. It is mind boggling to think through the whole process.

The eagerness of the Aussie PM to call Najib and the media conference said that they knew something already even before any confirmation by the lab. This is the Freudian slip.

Anyone thinking of conspiracy theory? I already have an outlined of how Hollywood would have scripted it. The big question is, what is the motive or what is it all about? Would they spare the lives of the passengers while trying to get what they want?

PS. The possibility of it flying through Singapore, say to Australia, is to file a flight plan ahead, disappeared from radar cover at the edge of KLIA radar cover, change the transponder code, reappear in the civilian flight corridor like any legitimate aircraft with the transponder squawking a new identity. No air trafficker would know anything unusual. The truth could be more dramatic than fiction.

MH370 – Abbot called Najib to report on rubbish found in the sea

Australian PM Abbot found it important enough to call Najib to inform him of some floating rubbish he found in the sea and had satellite pictures of it. And the Australian govt also found it so important to call a press conference on the discovery. Unbelieveable.
 
I am putting my neck out on this, that the area being search by the Australians would be the last place for the plane to be in. Using the logic of a reasonable man and all the facts available till now, MH370 cannot be in that region.
 
Why would the pilot make all the clever manoeuvres to evade radars just to fly the aircraft into the Antartics and ditch the plane there? It is effort all for nothing. If they wanted to ditch the aircraft, it could be done easier in any part of the South China Sea. And if the plane has ditched in the water, the black boxes would be beeping and this would be picked up by the satellites long ago, or by the Aussie planes in the area.
 
The fact that the hijacked aircraft was flown from where it was means that they wanted to bring it to a place of their own choosing. And they are not going to dump it anywhere. There are 239 lives on board, including the hijackers, and could be more. So far there has been no indication of the hijackers intending to kill themselves or the passengers.
 
To find the aircraft in the Antartics would be the most baffling thing and defy all reasons and logics. Still I can be logically wrong. Yes I can be logically wrong and cannot rule this slim possibility out.