Andrew Loh -
It is little wonder Singaporeans are anxious. Despite the government trumpeting that we have arrived as a “first-world country”, and boasts record GDP growth this year, and how “if Singapore Inc went for IPO, this is a $4 trillion company” (as PM Lee said in 2007), the fruits of economic growth seem to continue to elude them.
Indeed, even senior diplomat Tommy Koh weighed in on the issue of stagnant wages. “Singapore is a First World country with a Third World wage structure,” he said in September.
But wages is just one issue. Another, and perhaps a more emotional one, is that of the retirement age. We have heard everything from how we should not think of retirement, to how retirement will mean we’ll “shrivel up and face the wall”. Former NTUC Chief, Lim Boon Heng, the minister in charge of ageing issues, wants the retirement age to be raised from 62, to 65, then to 68 and finally to perhaps do away with it altogether.
Mr Lim was reported in June 2007 as “thinking of taking things a step further: to get Singaporeans to work beyond age 70.” (CNA)
Working till you drop, as the saying goes, seems to be the new economic philosophy of the government. Just like the two-is-enough population policy of the 1970s, many logical and persuasive arguments are being proferred by the government.
Working till your old age keeps you healthy and occupied. It helps you not to be a burden to your children. It affords you financial independence in your old age. You age “actively” – or what the government calls “active ageing”.
All well and good except that there is a fundamental flaw in this train of thought.
The basis for urging Singaporeans to work longer – and introducing legislation to coerce the people to do so – is that Singaporeans do not have enough to retire early.
This is a point which Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam raise in 2005. “This is of real concern,” he said, “because many Singaporeans in fact do not have enough in their CPF to meet even their basic retirement needs.” (MAS) Two years later, the government-controlled Straits Times repeated the concern. “According to surveys, many older Singaporeans do not have enough in their savings to retire on,” it said in a report titled, “The end of retirement”, in 2007. “The solution? Work longer.”
Yet, it seems no one has noticed the big fat white elephant in the room – where have all of Singaporeans’ money gone to?
“The Chinese have the highest savings rate in the world,” Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew said at the fifth Credit Suisse Salon held in Singapore in 2009, “followed by Singaporeans who save some 40 plus percent of their income.” (Credit Suisse).
That alone begs the question: why is it then that Singaporeans do not have enough to enable them to retire?
Some have put the blame on Singapore’s housing prices. This is not surprising, considering that more than 80 per cent of Singaporeans live in flats provided by the Housing and Development Board (HDB).
The trend of escalating prices for public housing continued into 2010, prompting the government to finally do something about it by introducing measures to “cool” the market earlier this year. (Property Guru)
These measures, however, are piecemeal, reactionary actions taken after the fact. Their effectiveness are yet to be seen as prices, since the measures were introduced, have not seen any significant decrease.
And to add salt to the wound, Labour chief Lim Swee Say, in 2007, “urged workers not to be alarmed by the possibility that the draw-down age for the Central Provident Fund (CPF) minimum sum might rise from 62 to 65.”
It is a point reiterated by Mr Lim Boon Heng as well. “If the retirement age is raised, then the CPF drawdown age would be raised as well,” Channelnewsasia reported him as saying.
So, where do all these leave Singaporeans?
They are urged to work till their old age. The CPF draw-down age is raised. The minimum sum in the CPF has already been increased, since July 2010, to S$123,000, from S$117,000. Also from July, the Medisave Minimum Sum (MMS) was raised to S$34,500 from S$32,000. (CNA)
On top of this, Singaporeans are urged to work “cheaper, better, faster”, and to “upskill, reskill, multiskill”, to “upgrade” themselves.
In solving Singapore’s ageing population problem, the government seems to have created even more problems for Singaporeans. The huge influx of cheap foreign labour which compete with Singaporeans for jobs (at all levels) is dismissed as “necessary” to keep us “competitive”.
Yet, one would wonder, as I mention earlier in this article, with all the accomplishments which Singapore has achieved – fastest growing economy, record job creations, S$4 trillion IPO if we were a company, highest savings rate, a people who put in the most number of weekly work hours in the world – all of which the government rattle of as a litany to prove its economic policies a success, why are Singaporeans still unable to retire to a life of peace and comfort, after a lifetime of slogging it out?
Clearly, something is not right somewhere.
While asking Singaporeans not to think of retirement and to adopt a life-long work attitude, the ministers themselves receive lifetime retirement payouts (pensions). Indeed, some serving ministers (those who’re above 55) are concurrently being paid the highest salaries in the world and receiving pensions at the same time.
Perhaps the answer and the solution no longer lies in trying to make the PAP government see this – especially when it has adopted an ultra pro-employer policy – but lies in registering our concern at the ballot box.
That, in my opinion, would be the responsible thing to do – as a Singaporean.
It will not only be for our own sake but also for the sake of our next generation.
We need new leaders. Our current ones have lost their way.
This too is clear.
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The govt just wants Singapore to work until the very moment they drop dead. It doesn’t want old people around cause it considers them useless and a liability. Like a company, it has no use for people who don’t want to slave for the organisation.
we need an alternative. our leaders have clearly lost their way. i love being taught Animal Farm in school, and we couldn’t help but see it happening to Singapore. the question is – how many of us who are privileged and not on the bottom of the pyramid are willing to give up some of what we have for a more equitable society?
A person who is able and wants to work should do so as long as it is meaningful work, regardless of the retirement age. I am in my early 30s and my generation cannot be expected to retire at age 60, unless the individual can fully fund their own retirement for the next 30 to 40 yrs. Personally, I expect myself to keep going till age 75 if there is meaningful work I can do.
As we are living longer, we need more money to ‘retire’ on. The CPF scheme was not set up to be relied on for full funded retirement, but as a partly funded one for a retiree staying with their children (their children funding much of their retirement through food, shelter, medical, etc).
There is nothing wrong with upskilling oneself professionally. Many are happy at their lot of life, happy at where they are, happy with not chaning; and that is their choice. Just know that there are many others who are constantly moving ahead.
Singaporeans have long been whipped into submission by the ruling party. I am highly pessimistic about any significant increase in the percentage of opposition votes, as we do not have enough credible opposition candidates to start with. Oppositional votes was 33% back in 2006. I would be surprised if it went to 40% in the next election. Even those who dislike the PAP grudgingly agree that the PAP is doing a good job running the country, although the number of mistakes they make are slowly increasing.
I think and feel that this article simply highlights existing issues already brought to light previously.
I would hv paid off my housing loan by the time I reach 55 this year. But I don’t know when I can finish the loan as my job was replaced by FT and I have bees driving taxi as my CPF is empty.
LBH says retirement up to 68?
owoowwo, that makes spore to another record.
In recent global event, UK and France raise this age to 62, 65 but spore is leading the way to 68????
Daniel,
Yes, retirement should be voluntary. However, the way things are skewed (such as depressed wages) by default forces one to work longer than perhaps one may have to.
Your generation (those in their 30s) can retire – if we see changes to govt policies in manpower/employment, housing, healthcare.
I am told it is quite rare for mortgage loans to be 30-years in other countries. I stand corrected but S’pore seem to be one of the exceptions in this.
It is true that “the CPF scheme was not set up to be relied on for full funded retirement”. So one must rely on private investments, savings and perhaps insurance.
However, how can one afford to pay for these when wages are depressed, esp for the bottom 20 per cent which has not seen any real increase in wages for the last 10 years – and worse, continue to see their wages depressed because of the influx of foreign workers?
Retirement should be voluntary. But if even GLCs such as SIA is cutting wages of older workers the moment they reach 60 (to avoid the upcoming re-employment requirement), how do you expect older workers to survive?
Working till you drop is not the solution. The solution lies in addressing the faults of the system and policies.
Not only have our current leaders lost their way… they have also lost their vision, their hearing (caring ear), their heart, their balls and everything else. Or maybe some of these things they did not have to begin with?
And I am sure many have lost all faith in, and respect for them.
Let’s see how their taste and smell go when they decide that “the ground is sweet” for the next General Elections.
If there is going to be no retirement, what about our CPF? Shouldn’t we re-look into that?
if you have not enough money you have to work, thats the fact of life
would andrew be so kind to donate to them instead, you expect money to fall from the sky?
Americans are getting anywhere from 15-30 years mortgage. 15 and 30 years being the most popular
in singapore, you can opt for less then 30 years, instead of getting a 5 room, get a 3 room at 10 years instead!
How do you know their wages are depressed in the first place? any evidence? Or some of the jobs simply not taken by locals?
Finland has comprehensive social security (see http://www.kela.fi/in/internet/english.nsf/). S’pore has almost no social security to speak of.
So will Lim Boon Heng implement Finland-style social security in S’pore???
All ministers (and senior civil servants) receive their pension from age 55. They start to receive $179,000 per annum from age 55 till the day they die.
Ordinary S’poreans not only have to make do with the crappy CPF system, but also can’t withdraw their monies till they are very old and fragile (if they are still alive)!!
Life will be meaningless if it is slogging, sweating and toiling all the way until you drop.
Retirement is a target in life that every working person will want to reach. Everyone would love to and should retire and spend quality time doing things that they may not have time for during their hectic working lives.
Our government has failed big time to make provision for our poor citizens’ supposedly golden age of retirement.
In fact, CPF was initially designed as a true retirement fund. However, over the years, our government, without real check and balances, has introduced schemes after schemes to make drawing out our hard-earned CPF more and more difficult. Already, the lower income group is finding it impossible to have any money left that can be withdrawn. It used to be at 55 that one would be able to retire and enjoy the fruits of his career. With the ever changing goalposts set by the incumbent government, many are withdrawn to the fate of their hard-earned salaries locked in CPF.
We can only hope that our leaders are wise enough to correct such unwise policies that lead to our poor citizens leading a meaningless life. Seeing all the adamant signs and signals coming from the incumbent government that they are infallible, we can only place our bet for a better life if we use our vote wisely.
I wonder why we have so many Ministers in the PMO doing coordination work and some without portfolios. Where can we find the job scopes of each Ministers, including the MM and the SM and the President? Given the remuneration they are getting, I can only assume that each of their jobs is uniquely important and cannot be done by any other Ministers and Ministries. And I am also wondering what do the Ministers discuss during Cabinet meetings if they are not discussing about how the Ministries should work together and how they can cooperate to make Singapore a better place for citizens? If they could be more productive in their meetings and in their work, they can save quite a bit of money and that can be utilized for many other things. One example will be to hire more teachers and more health care providers, at higher salaries?
Just a thought but I thought the senior Ministers should lead the country in heightening of volunteerism by not accepting salaries but work as volunteers in the PMO?
When that rich and elite subset of society does all the planning (housing, education, work, retirement, savings, investments) for the rest of the working class population, you can bet that its all about headline numbers and convenience, and little about dignity, pride and caring for the individual.
If we have the security system like the European countries, I might accept it.
Even the French cannot accept it, the unions there always have the workers welfare at heart.Hey! better, betterer ,What is our union during here??
Now, I cannot see my CPF money already if we are still under the PAP government.
All voters, if the PAP form the next government again, what is the consequences thereafter.I am sure you know what you will get.
In Europe, they are raising the retirement age because of having a lax welfare system for many years. They are paying for it now.
Singapore never had a welfare system, our savings rate is 40% and yet, we need to work till we drop.
Mr Loh, you have written a wonderful article. It will be kind of those who read it, to talk to old folks and spread the meassage about this issue.
I know a couple who have together worked 58 years between them, in the govt sector with simple wages. Today they don’t have much for retirement.
Thankfully they have good kids.
@kargesh
Do you what is the meaning if inflation and how much it has risen?
CPF is raising the retirement amount from $117K to $123K, in fact it goes up by $6K every year. This is accounting for inflation.
However, your salary does not go up by $6K each year. Why?
The initial plan to bring loads of foreigners were to sustain Singaporeans standard of living by taxing the foerigners.
However, it seems, that plan is failing as well.
One more election and if that fails. I am out of here.In fact I expect the govt to change. Singaporeans have always been practical, lets see what the do?
Because of pap policies, many sgporean choose to migrate to other nearby countries when they are old. so as to draw out all their hard earn cpf monies, enjoy it instead been lock inside cpf. i will migrate too if pap policies become unbearable..
Before our employer even pay us our first few cents of salary, you have already paid couple of dollars via the ERP gantries everyday. End of the month, how much net salary (after deducting all expenses paid to govt, and taxed by CPF). Not much is left because, like vacuum cleaner, PAP sucks out all the good things people have worked for, leaving us with nothing but disposal trash bag.
I have enough of MIW. Its either they go
in this GE or I go
Enough said!
Well said Andrew !
And I was hoping TOC did not censor what a moron has to say. Perhaps leave selected comments for about 1 week, then delete.
Call it enlightening TOC readers. LOL
Not so fast John tan, let’s see the outcome first. If it means 82 stooges again, I’ll say let’s go !
Daniel Lee,
You don’t know the history of CPF. It was originally REALLY meant for sustainable retirement living. Original rates of contribution was 25% from employee and 25% from employer — i.e. you are saving equivalent of 50% of your salary for retirement. It was meant to offer the private sector an alternative to the civil service / British-style pension scheme.
But during the late 70s and 80s, PAP reduced the rates, in order to promote Singapore as low-cost and to get MNCs to set up factories here. By late 80s, CPF contribution rates was 20% and 20% — 40% of your salary — still not too bad. Anybody who can save this amount throughout 30-40 years of working life will be able to have sufficient money for retirement.
The worse thing happened in 1986 when PAP decided to ramp up asset prices by allowing CPF to be used for housing, first for private properties, then later also for HDB. This resulted in super inflation of property prices up till today, as people used the maximum CPF available to pay for mortgage. Which in turn came back to bite the CPF members as the high property prices meant that most of the CPF (now is the Ordinary Account portion) is used up to buy house. Previously when CPF was not allowed for property, house prices increased only gradually and in-line with take-home salary increase.
When the money is not in your pocket but in some abstract CPF account, you feel no pain in whacking it all into property. PAP realise the mistake by the early 1990s, and quickly setup the 3 different CPF accounts: OA, SA and Medisave. People can only use OA to service house mortgage. But OA still forms the bulk of your CPF and it’s all gone into housing. For most people, the only thing left in their CPF for retirement is the SA, which is the smallest component. You cannot touch the Medisave except only for hospital bills, certain chronic diseases, and to pay for your medical insurance.
To make matters worse, by 1998 during the Asian Financial Crisis, PAP started using the CPF as a cost-control system — simply reducing the employer contribution whenever got recession in order to reduce companies’ costs. And then cannot increase the employer contribution back to original level liao. How come govt, as the largest land owner in Singapore, both direct landlord and thru GLCs, cannot offer a large reduction of rentals during recession instead? The largest business cost in Singapore is not worker salaries, it is rental and property costs.
That’s why the PAP, through their political meddling in the original CPF principles, have destroyed CPF as a viable retirement vehicle. It it now more of a wealth transfer instrument, to suck money from the people into govt entities, via inflated house prices, and 6% medical inflation.
With the Sovereign Wealth Fund managed by GIC and Temasek Holdings losing as much as the Ministery of Finance is transferring budget surplusses in their directions, Singaporeans are required to survive longer so as to contribute longer to be milked by this government formed by the “Pro Alien Party”.
Without a strong industrial base that can match the list of world reknown brands from South Korea, Taiwan, Japan and now China – how did the Singapore Government accumulate such a huge reserves that outstrip that of Taiwan and South Korea, and coming close to Japan ?
With Singapore not known for huge exports to rival South Korea or Taiwan, it will seem that with the Singapore Tax Revenue showing collections from Individual Tax about 70 per cent to that of Corporate Tax – clearly, Singaporeans are the source of the annual budget surplus.
This explains for the slew of new labor policy that came from both MOM and NTUC that serve to prolong Singaporean involvement in the labour force.
Since 2007, Singaporeans have been exhorted to accept the nex maxim of there being “no iron rice bowl” – which require acceptance to “job insecurity” with new short term employment based on 2 to 3 year renegotiable contracts.
This is made worst with the refusal to implement “minimum wages” – even as prices of our homes are inflated by deliberate measures to manipulate higher prices through controlled supply of new homes.
To fix Singaporeans further – and bolster the earlier measures already implemented – so as to ensure the continued involvement of Singaporeans in the Singapore economy and not to retire early with a secure retirement fund – new policies have been made to change or add new conditions that increase the amounts of CPF funds being withheld from being paid out at retirement age, with the age itself being further delayed.
When all the exhortations and policies – that are innocuously put up for Singaporeans to accept – are now pieced together and looked at as a whole picture, the sinister truth is that this Government has a big hole being hidden under their carpet – and probably has implications concerning their ability to payout our CPF.
The fact that this government formed by the “Pro Alien Party” has the shrewdness not to rock the boat by implementing all policies in close succession that will cause a storm, makes it even more difficult for us to feel the pinch, until the pinch becomes overwhelming painful to bear.
Clearly, Singaporeans have now reached our threshold of pain, and if the self-acclaimed elitist talents are so ‘DAFT’ to be unable to discern the present sentiments, a tsunami of pent up angst will surely surprise them at the right moment in the near future.
Atobe, Sums it up nicely..
1) Our ministers don’t care about changes to CPF withdrawal age or minimum sum because they are under a special tax-payers-funded pension scheme not available to Lesser Mortals. ministers star receiving from this pension from age 55….in addition to their world-record salaries.
2) There is a heavy survivorship bias in how ministerial salary is pegged to the top private sector pay. A private sector top earner could be bankrupt or retrenched the next year, but his place as the top earner then would be replaced by another. Therefore, ministers are guaranteed to do well in terms of salary.
3) Many of us only focus on the extremely high ministerial salary, but forgot about how ministers’ family members often benefit by virtue of the minister’s position of power. One only needs to check out the jobs held by close relatives/children of our ministers (eg. wife/brother/sister of the PM). This is a HUGE hidden benefits-in-kind of being a minister. That is precisely why leaders of all other countries are not drawing anywhere near what S’pore ministers have.
To whjho,
The usual idiot way PAP wants to one up everyone … 62 years … we can do better we go with 68 years even if it is the usual imbecile idiotic self stab itself infront of the whole wide world way…
You can count on these “over-paid” PAP ministers to “do” it…never mind the expense…the people of singapore will foot it…
Remember the recent YOG? 300% “over-spent” budget…maybe more since the books are not opened to a transparent audit…but still “ok lah” and “move along lah”…the PAP is treating all these hard accumulated monies by past / current generations of singapore as “easy money to spent cos not mine”…
Bunch of sickos. And over-rated “just really average intelligent” book idiots.
Haiz.
the population does know what kind of blood sucking leeaches the PAP government is. With pension plus million dollar salary I too want to work till 100. We need one PM supported by three to four aging bats to run this country. Wake up you idiot people..we have been screwed long enough
From the social point of view this is a rotten society. is not it is a shame to see old aunties and uncles clean the rubbish from the tables in the hawker centers and young kids playing with their iphones? Sooner or later this will end in a disaster.
Two of my 40+ local colleagues were axed recently and Lim Boon Heng said that we should work till 68?
Lim Boon Heng is nuts or what?
Most people can’t even guarantee that they will still have a job at 40, so how is it possible to work till 68?
DreamLand Minister talking about fairyland ideas while he is paid millions doing a shoddy job.
We have a bunch of stupid ministers!
MIND YOU ALL, YOUR JOBS ARE NOT GUARANTEED, BUT 10 OR 12% GST IS GUARANTEED AFTER ELECTION.
Even you are cheaper, better and faster also no use, when you reaches 40 still get axed.
My two axed colleagues were paid peanuts and work like horses, but still get axed!
LIM SWEE SAY SHOULD SAY
“CHEAPER, BETTER, FASTER AND YOUNGER”
PROVIDED YOU CAN STAY YOUNG FOREVER.
STUPID BASTARDS.
Imagine you buy an insurance for 35 years with the term that you would you would enjoy the fruit of your diligent savings at the age of 55. At the age of 50, you are suddenly told that for your “own good” the pay out would be deferred and then additional conditions are added to the contract without you having a say, to effectively make sure that you would never see the fruits that was originally promised. This is a breach of trust. It is no wonder many people will vote with their feet. Soon you will see our neighbouring countries coming with policies that would welcome the rich “retirees” who have to denounced their citizenships to enjoy their promises. If the number of people doing that is large then the ship will sink even if the insurance company has $4 trillion.
And somehow i have nagging suspicion that the idea of increasing the retirement age is not originated from the compassion thoughts of people having not enough to retire – especially when this is touted by people who are enjoying a handsome pension AND an obscene salary. These people have lost the moral authority.
Take note. For the millionaires and decision makers who always want to collect the Millions dollar salary, the will not want to retire early right.
So vote them out is the only SOLUTION,.
for the masses, holding onto a job past 40 itself an uphill task. so before the retirement age is raised yet again, have the powers that be made adequate policy changes on the employment front to support active employment?
much have been said about the mindset of employees, dun be choosey, dun be calculative, moderate (salary) expectation, be positive, so on. should employers also adopt a mindset to compliment & re-enforce good employees more positively to spur them on instead of penny pinching?
or would this be yet another honest mistake, oversight, etc? makes me wonder if the ruling elites follow book so dogmatically they thought it is the real world.
This is a powerful articles and should be use as rally speech. However, it is should trim and include how the opposition can turn the issue around if they were to be elected.
During the last election, I observed that most opposition are quick to bring out issues and problem that are to the the ear of them. However, very much short in propose a solution. This should be improved.
http://www.todayonline.com/Singapore/EDC101029-0000106/Live-longer,-work-longer?
in the latest propaganda by the official, it is deliberately emphasized that
1) finland has lower life expectancy than us
2) finland has higher retirement age than us
strategically, it is not mentioned that
3) finland works less than us
they work less, but steadily, so they can last longer and retire later. they do not have property crises giving them stress daily.
you will NOT read about this in mainstream media, mark my words. it will continue to be strategically obscured.
The fundamental problem in Singapore is that if you’re retrenched or jobless after 40, it is damn difficult to find another gainful employment. Unless you got elite connections and guanxi otherwise gone case.
From personal experience and feedback from my friends and acquaintances, now even those 37, 38 degree & diploma holders who are jobless face extreme difficulty in securing adequate jobs. Even govt agencies like WDA and CDCs are telling them to become taxi drivers and security guards. Or push & con them into spending money for training courses that will only pay them starting salary of $1,500 to $2,200. And getting a job after training is also not guaranteed, at most only 50-50 chance. This shows that the govt also no answer, and in practical terms has already given up.
Raising the retirement age has nothing to do with jobs at all. It is purely to control & prevent early withdrawal of CPF money. CPF and the govt does not have enough money to give to people at 62, 65 yrs old. This is another fundamental problem in Singapore.
Goh Keng Swee a true economist foresaw the monster created in CPF and step down and became a recluse.
Another old timer of SUBSTANCE Toh Chin Chye is staying mum except the statement of awarding the PMs job to LKY instead of Lim Chin Siong although LKY dispute it in the book MIW.
Both were definitely in the KNOW one is dead and the other???
When these multi-millionaire MIWs decree that Singaporeans should work even into their 70s, they mean that they should take on jobs such as cleaning, clearing & washing dishes, etc – poorly paid jobs which not even foreigners want. The future is very sad indeed for the majority of Singaporeans – armies of elderly citizens fighting for these low-paying, physically taxing jobs to survive, opening the door to even lower wages and exploitation of a very vulnerable segment of society.
To set good example to all Singaporean:Remove All ministers (and senior civil servants)pension schemes and allow them to continue to work till age 68 or till the day they die.
Lim Boon Heng is very very good @ his job
last year he hold the feeble hands of leekingyou as laulee walked up the stairs of national stadium durin national day parade…
if onLEE he can hold the hands of any 70ears ole peasants while they cleared the dishes from the hawker centres…
Mr Lim Boon Heng. “If the retirement age is raised, then the CPF drawdown age would be raised as well,” Channelnewsasia reported him as saying.
Then the dependants protections scheme coverage age should raise from current of 60 to 70 and coverage amount should also increase from current of $46k to $100k.
Now you know why Lim Boon Heng is a Minister Without Portfolio for the past eh….eh….sorry i lost count the number of years. Talk rubbish. Retire at 68 years old?
What has happenend in recent years our leaders has created a wide gulf between the people and them. One saving grace is that we are not a dictatorship and that will ironically work against the PAP in “soft” uprising, that is the ballot box. I think and alot of you too, that it is too late and deep for the PAP to make amends. People and including the young who are now in tertiary education are very pissed off with them. My guess is this generation will not hesitate to vote in the oposition. I’ve always voted for the opposition. I saw what was happening many years ago, about two crisis ago. It was very clear that the PAP was not really sincere in their talk and it only was about themselves. I am sad for this country, it has really gone to the dogs, I fear for my children. People do not be afraid , put that X on the opposition box on your ballot slip as I’ve always done.
I have been calling for the people to vote the Ministers out but I was given a reality check from a RC friend week. He said any MP or Ministers who is voted out will be given a plumb paying job with one of the GLCs. Even if position were not available one will be greated. He cited several example. He said PAP might be voted out but the economy will always remain under their control as they have puit in safeguards to ensure that ownership of GIC/Temasek and all GLC remains with them. This also applies to the public institutions like the courts/police and military. It looks like we cannot get rid of these leeaches.
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