Email #9 - Singapore and a summary

My last travel email comes from the comfort of the SIA airport lounge of Changi Airport where we are staying before flying back early tomorrow morning. We have been here over the past few days and attended Dad's 90th birthday lunch earlier today.

There is not much that need to be said about Singapore, mainly because we have been here often. The achievements of this island state are well known and undeniable but not much need to be added to that. I have come to the conclusion that Singapore is actually quite unremarkable, not because it does things badly but because it never tries to do anything more than being better than competition even though it does that well indeed. The World Economic forum ranks it third in the world in competitiveness, after Switzerland and USA. But the drive to excel seems to be only above competition but not excel for excellence' sake.

It is interesting to compare Singapore against Denmark which we just visited. Denmark ranked a close fourth behind Singapore in the WE forum study and is a quite a different country. Singapore should study closely why a country such as Denmark, a high cost and high tax country can be competitive, quite contrary to the alarming warnings given by Singapore leaders about the dire consequences not following the policies being pursued.

Even the casual visitor will not fail to notice that Singapore competitiveness seems to come out of its drive to reduce costs through wages. The 5 million people in the city today has 1 million guest workers many serving in the low-wage service and building industries. The reason always given is that Singaporeans do not want to perform those jobs. Of course not, at those wages !

In the prominent example of the metro, Singapore MRT is efficient, well staffed and trains come often, about once every 3-7 minutes. It seems they come only often enough to clear the platforms, and it would be better if they come a bit more frequently to reduce the wait and the congestions in the carriages. In Copenhagen, trains come a bit more often; they are consequently less crowded. There were no ticket sellers, no ticket collectors, no ticket scanners and not even train drivers. That must be how efficiency is driven in that country. And of course they collect very high taxes in order to pay well, provide free education, medical services, good pensions and unemployment benefits. All of which made a more relaxed society; and interestingly the taxi drivers don't complain about their government for the high taxes.

And where does all that leave Australia ?

cheers,
Kin Mun