S'pore can join top 1st World nations in 20 yrs time: MM Lee

last SG · 2007-02-26T15:24:39+00:00

Wow...your english has miraculously improved to 'bombastic' levels.... Papa poodle teach baby poodle how to jump through hoops...how sweet.... How is papa...

allentyb SG

LONG LIVE WORKERS PARTY

LazerLordz SG

We seriously need a reformist vision for SG. Rolling Eyes

fymk SG

10-20 years? The MM is promising what he probably cannot live to see. I find it really really disturbing.

Lefleche SG

But...what else can a politician say? Shocked

vito_corleone SG

im guessing its a hint of his uber-extended lifespan Laughing

robertteh SG

So by the latest speech when he said that Singapore will reach the first world in 20 year time, people are now left wondering what he had meant when he originally wrote in his memoir "From Third World to First"

Did he qualify in his memoir what he meant was the lower half of first world ?

maurizio13 SG

Don't you know Vampires live very long lives, unless they are exposed to "sunlight", otherwise they are immortals.

mancha SG

Wait for his memoir "From First World to Upper First".

robertteh SG

Hahaha, what a concoction of a make-believe success story.

Whether we have ever reached anywhere near second world upper is debatable.

If we ever reached the first world lower why are we having second thought about our ever claiming first world status and our middle class first world citizens are not shy having to ask for state assistance.

What kind of middle-class is this with our graduates or MBA resorting to driving taxis and suffering from unemployment blues and dropping wages like ours.

Figures are still not coming to tell us how many of our middle-class unemployed have got jobs in the current world recovery. We should be trying not to drop from second to the third or forth and by the way the country is being governed we will be lucky if we succeed.

maurizio13 SG

According to Wikipedia, first world nation refers to capitalistic democracies.

Italy being the last of the 20 nations of first world nation has a GDP per capita of US$29,280, Singapore has a GDP per capita of US$24,840.

20 years to reach GDP per capita of US$29,280, would imply an annual growth rate of 0.825%, not even a growth of 1%. I thought every year they claim that our economy is growing at 4% to 5%.

Hmmm....Wikipedia gave a higher GDP per capita for Singapore which is US$28,368, while Italy GDP per capita is US$29,700. Capitalistically we are there, but democratically, we are about 20 years behind. In another way, the old man does not want to relinquish his control till he's dead.

I sure hope he doesn't rise from his grave thereafter, if opposition were to win the election. I swear I would change my religion to Leeddhism and use the letter "L" as a symbol for this new religion.

Maybe he was talking about the precept of civil liberties, which would insurmountably take 20 years to reform. But will never ever be a reality in his or his son's lifetime.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_world_nation

Civil liberties are suppressed to protect their own selfish interest of dominance and greed.

Meia Gisborn SG

After attaining a ranking in the upper half of the First World nations, will the rest of the world finally be able to locate Singapore on a world map, and not mistake it as being part of China?

maurizio13 SG

I spoke to a Chinese friend of mine, she actually thinks that Singapore is a part of China. Nevertheless she said it will be annexed like Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau.

Hehehe

Frankly I won't notice the difference if China annexes Singapore, China doesn't have civil liberties, we don't have either.

robertteh SG

Economically, politically, socially and culturally there existed many opportunities since the 1970s to upgrade our status and competitiveness.

However despite our achieving many initial successes, the leaders were over-confident of their own conceptual top-down leadership abilities which was already hitting hard bottom as seen by their lack of progress in restructuring the economy during several past prolonged recessions.

It would seem that their so-called leadership system would continue to consist of taxing and recovering costs to the fullest, promoting narrow-minded meritocracy which only benefit a few of their own party connections and pro-foreign investment and employment policies.

Hence we have missed valuable opportunities to upgrade to broad-based practical knowledge application as posted to the Feedback Unit for years.

Based on our educated and skilled population and the surpluses we have built up we could have upgraded the economy to value-adding technology-driven model from the 1970s.

We could have reached first-world standard if there was greater willingness to adapt and change.

The domestic sector of the economy therefore suffered for years from stagnation due to taxing and over-charging on lands and resources by the state and an extremely anti-progress and anti-entrepreneur overly pro-foreign investments and economic management.

Many suggestions were made but there was little change of such past policies.

Our lack of economic resilience among our own domestic sector of the economy from business to new technology start-ups was mainly caused by such narrow-minded top-down conceptual management.

To reach the first world standard economically and socially, many of such narrow-minded policies aimed at maintaining political control and perpetuation of power have to be moderated or changed.

Our younger ministers and post-65 MPs have not come up with new solutions or new political process and building up our pro-people cultural and social environment.

The leaders are still essentially tinkering with past policies instead of restructuring the economy with new pro-entrepreneur investment incentives among our own citizens.

How far can we go with only such narrow pro-control system.

chiabaliao SG

One big difference - the Chinese dare to practise civil liberties, the Singaporean wimps cower in fear.

maurizio13 SG

Top down approach to management is obsolete in the current global economic climate.

Abstract from Exploring Corporate Strategy by Johnson & Scholes:

"the idea that strategy is formulated in a top-down way is questionable, and the extension of this, that mechanistic structures and controls are necessarily appropriate, is therefore also questionable. Indeed, in a fast-moving world it is better to think about these issues of organising in an active and fluid way rather than the more static concepts of organisational design."

As with any change management, paradigm, culture and tradition are oft the most difficult to change. You cannot elicit a change without changing the whole management personnel as is mostly the case with corporate takeovers.

They tend to think that what has worked well for 42 years will continue to work well way into the future.

maurizio13 SG

Agree. They have exhibited such bravery by standing up to the authorities during 6-1 crackdown. They have balls unlike Singaporeans who cower in the pressence of authorities. Throughout the years we have been manipulated by the old man to fear the authorities, even when our own civil liberties are violated.

Gazelle SG

We know that, computer heros like you all got no balls.

maurizio13 SG

Is that the best response you can garner with all your intellectual prowess?

Seems like through the years, the quality of PAP lackeys are lacking, no wonder they are falling out of favour with the citizens. I think they should start recruiting people of higher calibre for lackeys, else next election, they might get 49%.

Hehehe......

Was it nature or nurture that resulted in the impairment of your cerebrum?

Think I rather put the blame on nature, else we would have to discredit the government's educational policy again, which you so strongly protect.

I guess intelligence must have been a recessive trait in your genes, that would explain the current situation. Or maybe it's a consequence of inbreeding.

spencer99 SG

I recall that a couple of years ago when PM Goh was the PM, he said that Singapore will reach "Swiss" "standard of living".. in X number of years....

Well, where r we now???

maurizio13 SG

Empty promises???

Hmmm..... Evil or Very Mad

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