The past policies are causing too many problems:-
(1) Meritocracy - over-produces academicians, breeds elitism and
class divisions, hyping the government civil service wage costs,
neglect of practical knowledge application and developing
entrepreneurship.
(2) Pro-foreign investment and jobs policy - foreign companies are
gradually proving to be our nemesis. They have been pulling out
from our economy for quite some time now and are still doing so
because of our high costs of doing business (not necessarily due to
workers' wages, but overpaid higher echelons)
The above-stated policies are not likely to change for a while.
Government is still pushing for foreign investments as the main
pillar of our economy.
Sad to say, we do not have that much time to wait for another ten
years to upgrade our economic structure to VALUE-ADDING
TECHNOLOGY-ORIENTED MODEL LIKE THAT OF Finland, Denmark,
Switzerland, Korea and Japan.
Yet the above-stated major problems are unlikely to be solved by
the present ministers very soon. They have been trying to do so
since the last two recessions with no news about implementing their
VALUE-ADDING economic model. There is no news of consistent
applications of knowledge and innovations at the workers'
level.
What is for certain is that the ministers have totally neglected
maximizing the returns on our available assets e.g. hundreds of
thousands of middle-aged and older unemployed, new graduates who
cannot find jobs for prolonged period of up to 6 months, and
over-supply of scholars who are under-used.
My suggestion is to set up a NEW MINISTRY - Ministry of Internal
Resources to create investments and jobs ...making use of all our
unemployed available at lower costs than even FTs...making use of
empty lands and factories which need not be charged at full rentals
etc.