With reference to today’s Straits Times article where Mr Mah Bow Tan said it is not true that HDB resale prices have outstripped income growth. He supported his statement with the following statistics:
This is the data behind the graph:
I would like to point out that the choice of the base year can be very significant. Let’s see what happens when we change the base year to 2000 and 2001…And if we look at it since the last General Election:
Resale prices up by 45.6%, while median household income is up 21.3%. Choosing a suitable base year to support your conclusions is quite a useful trick that we should all learn.
Read the entire article here: HAZEL POA
Here’s the Straits Times article in question (click to enlarge). (Courtesy of Singaporean Mind).
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The brotherhood has already warned us all abt this a very long time ago Hazel. What’s new about this. Its simple math.
today’s newspaper:
If her calculations are correct, some policy recalibration is required to ensure that housing does not become a bigger financial burden on Singaporeans, as that will lead to Singaporeans having insufficient funds for their retirement.
hmm, so if Hazel is correct, we only have a Recalibration problem? not a Population Has Been Misguided By Erroneous Statistics problem? or a Minister Does Not Understand Statistics problem? or a Opposition Party Member Is More Correct Than Ruling Party problem?
my value judgement needs recalibration now. oh god, help us all.
could we get Ms Poa please to plot such a graph:
plot the income index as given from 1999 to 2009
now add in multiple lines – each line is the property price line, but intersecting at different base years from 1999 to 2008.
i.e. along the single income line, many property price lines “branch” out from its intersection based on different base years.
you will notice that only the 1999 branch ends up with the property line in 2009 low – all other branching lines end up with property line higher at 2009.
i.e. the Chosen Year 1999 “so happens” to be the year that produces the nicest result to support government excuses, even nicer than 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008.
after seeing this graph, please Recalibrate your monitors in case you are seeing an Astroturfed Graph.