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Abstracts of essays; news; announcements; short takes.
About Me
- Yawning Bread Sampler
- This blog carries summary abstracts of Yawning Bread essays, with space for comments.
Here too are other tidbits that are too short for the main Yawning Bread site.
To email me, go to the main site.
Blog Archive
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2007
(161)
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April
(13)
- Rage in safe Singapore
- Indiana billboard vandalised
- Digging into foundations is mischief
- Highly paid moral weasels
- The oracle from St James
- Some get married, others get raped
- Gobsmacking days
- How a traffic jam began
- Beware being caught out when the tide turns
- Defending the national scripture
- Cinema: Two stories from the slums
- Ministers get pensions too
- Lights, action..... and cut
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April
(13)
Posts
9 comments:
Yes, chia asked this back in 2004 i believe. Which is why the ministerial salary raise is so ridiculous, not to mention the president's too. They see it as their rightful entitlements and god given right to feed off the country. Political hegemony has perverted the meaning of servitude and led to moral bankruptcy.
anonymous 13:16, didn't you read the essay before commenting? I showed from the Parliament transcript that Steve Chia DID ask the question.
I am astonished to learn that they can be paid a pension AND a salary at the same time. Wow.
It seems the topic about pay rise is debated to
death and we all know what the outcome is going to be.
I hear reasons such a integrity and talent thrown about like
these things are so rare.
But is it?
If we have to pay too much for integrity, shouldn't we
try to find a better way? If the cost of transparency
and good governance can reduce the price for integrity,
such as the case in the NKF, should we not use it?
Dismissing the Press as the 4th estate is being too
presumptious. Even public outcry should stand for something.
Like the saying goes, there is no smoke without fire.
Let's take taxes as an example, imagine if the formula is not disclosed,
then only your tax man had knowledge of doing your annual tax
and you didn't. Its time to file your taxes. If your tax man
told you your business owes x amount of taxes, you are powerless
because you do not know how taxes are computated,
nor do you have the knowledge to check his work, and challenge
his figures. Now imagine if the formula is disclosed, you can now hire
someone to check the tax man's figure. Better yet, you can learn to do
it yourself. Last of all, if the tax man's figure is wrong, you can
fight for fairness. Shouldn't this be the case?
What about talent you ask? Surely that is worth paying for?
Again this logic is flawed. Is there a talent monopoly for commen sense?
Common law is developed based on the average intelligent man's ability
to reason a case. Some times this interpretation may be overturned
when the reason is tested in a different light under different
circumstances. The business of government is mostly about administration,
and governing with what is reasonable law. Both of which does not
require talent in abundance. Risk and commercial undertakings for profit,
now that is where one gets punished or rewarded, and I am sure,
the less talented would fear to tread, self selecting themselves
from the more special group of people.
In the end if we choose to remain ignorant and allow others to choose for
us, we will inevitably suffer the consequences.
it takes a minister with a very strong sense of entitlement to go up to the PM and ask for more money; is it a good legacy to leave behind, to be remembered for?
asiayouthmedia.com
So Greedy....
PSD has clarified the quantum of Ministerial pensions. Please refer to
http://app.psd.gov.sg/data/Reply%20to%20ST%20forum%20letters_4Apr07.pdf
I quote,
"The maximum pension for a Minister drawing a total annual salary of $1.2 million is $176,500 per annum (not $792,000), and to get that maximum pension the Minister has to serve for 18 years. Pensions have been frozen since 1994, so that all salary revisions since then (and this one) will have no effect on pensions."
IMHO, a lack of transparency makes the civil and political servants in Singapore cost more than they should.
Good job if you can get it! The way they are cossetted from anointment to grave no wonder we do not get very far - and if we believe all the hype in ST we are stupid.
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