(06-11-2013, 12:59 PM)specuvestor Wrote: [ -> ]In the employment statistics, there are categories of people who "give up looking for work". The environment is also important to incentive people to do better. If they think it is hopeless they will give up... which is the primary argument when we talk about glass ceilings fior women. Your environment is very different if you are born in Myanmar or in Singapore with the same IQ. If former, you might just be a farmer because it is hard for you to do anything else but if you are born in Singapore you might be in Finance with a Myanmar maid. That's the luck of the draw that Buffett keep expounding that he is lucky to be born in the US where his skill is favored.
Nonetheless there are definitely people who don't want to work. I happen to have a few social workers ex-classmates as well. But I would deem these people as the minorities as the drug mules or suicide bombers. They are real but most of the time they do not repressent the majority. In aggregate it is usually the incentive and environment that produces excellence (think silicon valley). The system should be helping those who are willing to work to benefit. Hence the workfare system is a good system IMHO. The system should help those who wants to study to excel regardless of family or financial background. In short the system should help those who help themselves. Welfare is NOT about giving freebies but there are also those involuntary conditions which like you said, "who really cannot work and need help ". Key word is "involuntary"
China is moving into "quality growth" not "quality of life" which I think you are misunderstood me, though it also means an improvement in the quality of products and services they provide. They had to produce quantity because it was needed in an en masse urbanisation. Just like one-child policy WAS the right policy. Things change and the policies should change too if the first principles are no longer valid.
Nobody is saying to "prohibit foreign companies" to come here. They also look at the environment: from physical to social to tax to productivity adjusted profitability. They have a reason to come here and so does the rich. Question is how we structure properly so the right ones do come and be vested.
The environment is definitely important in incentivise people to do better but is that the only one? Doesn't the traits of each human play a part as well? I study psychology before and there are some traits which have been pre-disposed in you when you are born. Some call it the genes. Or are you saying that if the government provides the right environment and right incentives, everyone would get up and work hard? US has silicon valley but there are still poor people there. There are beggars as well. There are crazy people who shoot others in the airport.
ok. Since it has been agreed upon that "there are definitely people who don't want to work", let's get back to the topic on how to eradicate poverty? It is simply not possible and it would just be made worse if we define a poverty line. I am not saying that you want this line. I am merely talking about the hot topic that HK is doing now by drawing a poverty line.
Some people did point out that it is difficult to draw a poverty line. This is just one point. A second point is are we encouraging more people to laze around if we draw a poverty line? Let's assume that the government decide to give $1k monthly to those below a poverty line. Isn't that nice? Let me put this figure as $1.5k monthly. A person who is currently earning $1.4k decides that since he is below the poverty line, he is eligible to receive another $1K from the government. That would be $2.4K. Quite a good amount to live comfortably here.
Then those earning $2K can only take back $2K. He would be worse off than those below the poverty line so why must he work so hard? He might as well resigned and find another lower paying job that is below $1.5K. Then, there would be those who feel $1K is ok as long as he has 3 meals daily. Thus, he decides not to work even though working would better his life. Why must I work when I can have 3 meals daily with government giving?
The main question is what behaviours are we encouraging with each policy that is been made? Sure there are those who benefit and sure there are those who want to game the system.
Good that you have clarified that it is quality growth that China wants. I am not sure where you read it but that is fine. Would they be able to sacrifice quantity growth? Not possible. They would just move the factories to the third tier and fourth tier states.
Business owners are clever. If China becomes too expensive, they would just move their factories to India or other cheaper countries. China is huge. If they want to keep their growth, they would not kick out the foreign companies. They would get foreign companies to join with their SOE to continue the growth. Of course, at the moment we do not know what they want from the "quantity growth" that you are espousing and it would be too early to see if they are right or wrong in their quantity growth.
No, I am not saying that you want to "prohibit foreign companies". I am talking about the xenophobia that people are experiencing now. If you have read the papers, you would have seen articles on slowing growth, importing lesser foreigners. I am not saying that we should import all the foreigners but at the same time, we cannot prohibit them from coming in (e.g. setting up companies). We need people to prop up our Singapore dollars and in order to do so, we would have to "steal" the money from the world by getting them to sell their home currencies and buying SGD.