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Warning : Please do not take this as a bashing thread.
Bashing government policies without offering viable alternatives equates to rubbish.

While I generally feel that foreigners are ok, there are some policies that I think, needs addressing.

First, what is talent in the context of bringing in foreigners?
Someone/some knowledge we lack, and cannot produce locally quickly/fast enough?

I admit there will always be a need, given that we need manpower to fuel the economy. The alternative of having slow growth is really not enviable. Looking at some European countries and US cities, where the people have no jobs, no money.... I don't think I want to go there.
We need to understand, while we can probably afford some slow growth, to go on long term is untenable. Others will move and catch up and if we cut ourselves slack and would our position be unrecoverable? No one knows but why take the chance.

However, are all talents that we bring in is something we lack or cannot produce quickly?

Case in point, I accompany my father to the public hospital for checkup. Cannot help but noticed that we have foreign doctors now.
My first thought, really, we lack of local doctors?
Maybe.... Is it due to difficulty getting into local university to study medicine that causes the shortage? As far as I know, there are always people applying to study medicine. But NUS only admits a certain number.
Are we shooting ourselves in the feet by limiting our own ability to produce doctors by our high standards while maybe, just maybe, allowing some doctors from other countries which may not have the exacting standards that NUS have coming in to work as a doc? A backdoor of some kind?

If lack of doctors, why not increase the intake and lengthen the number of years they need to serve in public hospital with no release clause/punitive clauses that really takes a hit at people's pocket like $1 million. After all, they want to be doctors due to "passion". Serving an additional 3-4 years should be able to tell if your "passion" is sustainable.

I get the same feeling about other workers. We have people that qualify for foreign universities but rejected by our own. While it is damn easy for foreigners to get a degree in their own country and come and take jobs here. We also know that people that moves out of Sg do not come back. Are we again shooting ourselves here?

Are we disadvantaging our own people because of our exacting standards?

I got the feeling that the current generation of policy makers do not think as far and thorough as their predecessor.

I know of many people who wanted to study medicine with quite good academic results. But couldnt get a place in local univ. I seriously think, if the gov really want to increase the local produced doctors, it is not difficult. More resources should be put into training more local doctors.

The shortage of doctors is causing esacalating health care cost here. I am not sure why more money can be pumped into spending on transport, defence, subsidising SMEs etc, but so far little has been done to train more local docs. Maybe there are reasons that we are "not supposed" to know.

Cronynism is rampant is SG..

Lawyers and Doctors are protected profession..
Look at the PAP MPs and their relatives..
All doctors and lawyers...

How many of their relatives, sons, daughters are engineers??? researcher??

PAP has effectively created all these shortages to protect their cliche...

A doctor in SG earns a lot as compared to doctors in Australia because there's plenty of doctors there..

i think it's all boils down to what is the cost of training one doctor in NUS compare to what is the cost of importing one FT doctor?
What is the difference of expectations of a locally trained doctor to an imported FT doctor?
And blah.....
And so is with every other jobs in Singapore.
But please don't forget the social cost to Singapore as a whole.
The social cost may be too much to bear for most Singaporeans.
i think it almost to the limit now.

(30-05-2014, 11:05 AM)Temperament Wrote: [ -> ]i think it's all boils down to what is the cost of training one doctor in NUS compare to what is the cost of importing one FT doctor?
What is the difference of expectations of a locally trained doctor to an imported FT doctor?
And blah.....
And so is with every other jobs in Singapore.
But please don't forget the social cost to Singapore as a whole.
The social cost may be too much to bear for most Singaporeans.
i think it almost to the limit now.

There is no "to the limit". And there is no "to the end". There is only "to eternity".

(30-05-2014, 11:05 AM)Temperament Wrote: [ -> ]i think it's all boils down to what is the cost of training one doctor in NUS compare to what is the cost of importing one FT doctor?
What is the difference of expectations of a locally trained doctor to an imported FT doctor?
And blah.....
And so is with every other jobs in Singapore.
But please don't forget the social cost to Singapore as a whole.
The social cost may be too much to bear for most Singaporeans.
i think it almost to the limit now.

However the point of training cost is moot, given that we are taking in doctors from overseas. Do you expect less from a foreign doctor when you are visiting a hospital here in SG?
If you are expecting the same experience, then are we saying that the foreign doctors are as good.
And if they are as good, then if we find we are not able to train that many doctors due to cost, should we also consider to outsourcing the training to other places? After all cost is all that matters?

I think there are enough doctors around just not at the g hospitals, after their bond many go into private practice or join private hospital earn bigger bucks.

IT n engineering sectors are a goner for locals after the mass import of FT.
Stagnant pay, high prospect of retrenchment!

(30-05-2014, 11:23 AM)tikam tikam Wrote: [ -> ]

(30-05-2014, 11:05 AM)Temperament Wrote: [ -> ]i think it's all boils down to what is the cost of training one doctor in NUS compare to what is the cost of importing one FT doctor?
What is the difference of expectations of a locally trained doctor to an imported FT doctor?
And blah.....
And so is with every other jobs in Singapore.
But please don't forget the social cost to Singapore as a whole.
The social cost may be too much to bear for most Singaporeans.
i think it almost to the limit now.

There is no "to the limit". And there is no "to the end". There is only "to eternity".

Ha! Ha!
May i digress a bit.
Christians do think of "to ETERNITY"
If what we do is only for now and then, then what all we do is for VANITY only.
i am going to buy a million dollars watch or car, tomorrow.
Why?
For VANITY, of course.

My point is not that there are enough doctors.... is that are we disadvantaging our own citizens by holding perceive high entry standards in our universities, while allowing workers from other countries in with not that high standards into SG.

AS far as I am aware, when people apply for work, most companies will just look at university degree, yes, no... etc.... not the quality of the degree. If I am NUS graduate, I might market myself higher due to the perceive value that I am getting from NUS, but when compare to some unknown foreign universities, whose graduate asked for so much lower, I am at a disadvantage, instead of advantage. My marketability will be hampered and the job market will be smaller, only discerning companies will take note, and that is still dependent on the HR and the hiring manager.

This is a globalised world now. We cannot think of just locally. We've got to consider outside influence. We should make S'poreans feel that we are not disadvantaged. But that is what I don't see from the policies that we have. We open ourselves wide to compete, only the creme de la creme will make it, but what about the majority??