Angel,
I am not against foreigners with talent working in Singapore. I
am a 'talent' export from this country to PRC and I support qualify
and capable individual that work in my country. The problem is that
Singapore are importing less capable and qualify individual
and they are NOT TALENT. The purpose as to hire them to
compete with local citizens in lowering the wages/salary and the
living standard in Singapore. NO COUNTRY IN THE WORLD adop
this type of policy, not even in PRC where I am working.
During CNY, I met with friends and ex-colleagues who are
qualified Singapore Accountant in their mid 30s/40s. I counted 3
out of 10 who are now working overseas and the remainders are
either in the public service or as Public Accountants. To my
surprise, the Public Accountants are struggling to meet
end needs after the rule changes where their main source of
income, auditing are no longer compulsory. Accountants from Indian
are taking employment at all level of positions in the financial
industry now. I have serious doubt over these ppl cabability
or 'talent' given Singapore financial talent are widely known for
their knowledge and international exposure. So the question is why
are company taking accountants from elsewhere where local
accountant are more superior in training and international
experience???? There are probably two reasons 1) Singapore
companies have access to cheap accountant from India, hence it does
not make sense to pay more for local accountant to keep books. 2)
The saying that all birds with same feather flock
together...when I am in PRC, my preference is to take another
Singapore accountant for the language and cultural behaviour if two
candidates (both a local PRC and Singaporean Accountant) are
competing for the same position. Unfortunately, in PRC, we can only
take foreigner in key position. The reverse is probably happening
in Singapore where the Indian CFO could take cheaper accountants to
work for him rather than taking a Singaporean.
I think most other jobs in Sinagapore, be in Engineers, HR etc
are facing the same predicament that Singapore Accountants are
facing.
Dear ah Wm,
I understand your concern, as i said earlier, we singaporeans,
the society and economy had reached a point of diminishing Marginal
utility, meaning that we are overestimated ourselves, overpaid
ourselves and over spoonfeeded ourselves that we had reach a point
of thinking that we must be paid a higher salary in comparing to
the cost of living, that is exactly what is happening in Japan, as
such that for decades, they cannot turn up their economy because
peoples refused to have competitive wage system adhered to a global
market, and eventually even their own MNCs had moved out. We have
to remember competitive in our wage flexibility, otherwise, as an
industrial dependent country without any natural resources beside
some rambutans, we would be history if we continuing to have a
rigid wage structure of getting high and higher paid without
knowing that the global market is not that much.
As i said again, in term of social economy, we also have to look
at the society as a whole, we are in a diminishing birthrate and
aging population, with less young in the market and more old
leaving the market, the funnel had tilted upside down, previous
being 10 youngs support 2 olds, now it is almost 5 youngs support 5
olds and in 10 years time it will be 2 youngs supporting 10 olds
who are no more contributing to the economy. It will be a heavy
burden on these youngs which i am also one of them. You may be
right that we are not attracting first class talent here, and
certainly not singaporean like your type of class here, but our
population is at stake in near future, do you understand that in
the first place??? Aren't we too selfish to let our youngs suffer
later. And do you think the govt like to implement unpopular
policies such as allow more immigrant in,...there is simply no
choice. Govt dun mind call all foreigners go back and win a big
margin election votes, but they take their chance, because they
know the consquences of a diminishing population, by which
singapore economy depend on it. Human resource.
Changes and adjustment is never going to be easy, i understand
that, going overseas are not for bosses, it is usually those lower
in rank such as you, sg accountants are in great demand in China,
why? because sg accountants are consider clean. That is your
advantage, but dun take it so lightly, as you rightly put it,
indian accountant are on the rise, but luckily, Chinese dun like
indian, so Sing goes to China, Indian come to Sg. Nevertheless,
like it or not, it is a global market, it is good actually for you
or your friend to see for themselves how worthy is an accountant in
a global market, from there you guys set your priorty, if you have
been spending lavishly, think twice, santa claus days are over. You
have market yourself, given you at your heyday of your career
facing such problem, by the time we, the young ones come into the
market, we would had prepared ourselves and knows our value.
Therefore, for you and your friend, they need to adjust to the
market a global market not just simply a Singapore market.
Simply put it, as a boss, if an indian can delivery me a good
accounting report and settle the auditors, i dun mind employing him
at a lower rate than a Singaporeans, this tell you that the society
as a whole, professionals are not peoples who can command a high
paid, but simply a mere worker as any other working class. When you
go US or british or aussie to find jobs, you dun demand alots
because you want to be competitive with the locals there, you
get the jobs, so the Aussies, Brits and Americans are facing
the same problem, but are they complaining, no, because they
understand what is globalisation, a bounderless economy and labour
which they created.
