Super talents that are not

Our supertalents are at best good in names only. Or if not, the only skill they have is to hire consultants to do the job and thinking for them. But that surely does not require much talent. Most of the poorly educated Ah Beng bosses are doing the same thing, employing MBAs and PhDs to work for them. We are engaging consultants to study and find solutions to get out of the Brazil list of tax havens. And we know why we were in the list. Our tax bracket is below 18%. And the Brazilians need to include us there so that they can tax their own companies operating here and our companies operating in Brazil. The Brazilian Embassy said so. Do we really need to pay millions to consultants to study on this? Don't we have any local talents to do the same thinking?

Wrongful allocation of resources

One of the major strategic error of our education system is the allocation of university places to less financially rewarding courses. Every year thousands of fresh undergrads were admitted to the Arts, Social Sciences, or even Engineering Facualties and only a few hundreds to the extremely lucrative Law School. And when these students graduated and go into the job market, the law graduates on the average are going to earn 10 times more than the other graduates after a few years in the profession. What the system should do is to reverse the intake. Send a few thousand students to take up law and a few hundred for the other courses. Then we will produce students that are highly marketable and in demand. The legal profession will be happy, the civil service will be happy as there will be no shortage of lawyers, the parents will be happy and the graduates will also be happy. Now, why should we continue to send so many students to pursue courses that are economically to their disadvantage? And the students and parents knew but could not get them into Law School because of an artificially created small number of places available. There is no shortage of students wanting to study law and all of them will be very qualified for the course. Or are we underpaying the graduates of the other courses?

Does CPF changes affect Malaysians/PRs?

I don't think all these Minimum Sum, Medisave and delayed withdrawal will affect Malaysians or PRs working here. Not very sure on this. Any one knows? Or would it mean that Singaporeans are now even worst off than non Singaporeans on this?

Subsidised patients demand for same standard

A letter by Lee Sze Teck to Today in a way demanded that subsidised patients must received the same standard of treatment. This is how foolish Singaporeans have become. Doesn't he know that a little tipping can get one ahead of a queue? Did he know that you pay for good service and better quality of service? The case was over sick leave and hospitalisation leave. The former is normally 14 days paid leave and the latter can continued to be paid on sick leave up to 6 months. And the patient wanted the doctor to change the sick leave to hospitalisation leave. The reply by the hospital is less than satisfactory. Either the patient deserved sick leave or hospitalisation must be dependent on the medical condition. To say that a subsidised patient cannot make any request for such a change is distasteful. But that is a different issue. Subsidised patients cannot expect the same quality of medical care as one who paid more. That is a brutal fact of life that they must accept. What they can expect is decent quality medical care. They are not going to get the most expensive and best doctor to attend to them. They are not going to get the most expensive medicine available for free or at a heavily subsidised price. They are not going to get all the frills and thrills that money can buy. Subsidised patients are there to be treated just for his/her medical condition with due medical care and attention by a qualified doctor or professional. Yes, they cannot demand or choose who should treat them. They want that, they must pay for it. They think this is a communist country where all men are equal? Stupid Singaporeans.

Did Jonathan Lock get a fair deal?

Jonathan Lock and his lawyer called a truce and both withdrew their cases against each other. Is it a fair and just ending? Did our justice system provide the justice due to either of them? Would Jonathan Lock withdraw his claims against his lawyer if not for fear of mounting legal cost should he pursue the case? And for pursuing his case, his lawyer will counter sue him for defamation, which means that he may even incur more financial losses. So Jonathan Lock chickened out. He had to abandon his claim against his lawyer not that he did not have a case. But the punitive legal cost was a huge obstacle to cross. The poor citizens will forever be faced with such a situation, not to pursue a legal tussle because they cannot afford it. And anyone who is faced with a legal claim, or any apparent wrong, could simply threaten to sue if he has money, and win.

New kinds of entrepreneurship

While touting is raising its head among taxi drivers, don't blame them entirely. It is a way of living, to earn that extra $2 to feed the rising cost of living. Look at it positively, it is entrepreneurship. Not everyone has millions of dollars in their war chests to fight in the big league. The small guys have their own turfs to play with. Look around the kopitiams and MRT stations and you will notice a new kind of buzz. More entrepreneurial people are setting up shops, as buskers and beggars. Very lucrative and low capital. Tax free also. These different kinds of talents need an outlet to earn a living. Can't just dump them behind bars. Too costly. And they need to survive in this very costly city. The GST of 7% is eating into their bones. Shall we support such entrepreneurship? Shall we give them a chance to earn a few dollars?

PSLE, communication gap?

Tan Yap Kwang, Executive Director of the Singapore Examinations and Assessment Board replied to the recent furore on the difficult PSLE Maths Paper. What he was saying was that there was no difference between this year and last year's paper. The questions were set from a blueprint by experienced teachers and examiners. I tend to agree with his comments. The only possibility, if there is an increase in difficulty, is for someone to try out something new. Given the constant change in policies recently, this cannot be ruled out. Otherwise, given the regularity of the examinations over the years, they are unlikely to err too far away. From a different angle, some parents may feel that their children are geniuses and are expected to get 100 marks. And some will see anything less than 100% correct as bad. What may be of concern is to set too high a level of difficulty that frightens or stresses out the young minds. But if this was explained to them in advance and they know what to expect, then it should not be an issue. The children and parents must expect some of the questions to be beyond them. Is there a communication gap?