Political elasticity from Jamus Lim

For someone 'full of compassion', who came to lecture the House on the need to be compassionate, Jamus Lim has clearly not given much thought to the minimum wage.

He did not even know the minimum wage proposed in his own party's manifesto. He came to give a lecture on compassion over efficiency without any idea what the minimum wage should be

It took him 2 months to discover that his party proposed $1300 TAKE-HOME minimum wage.

It is quite clear that Jamus prefers to impress with economics and economic theories and studies.

In economics, elasticity is the measurement of the percentage change of one economic variable in response to a change in another.

Andy See was spot on when he described Jamus' extraordinary transition from "don't know" to "gross pay" to "take-home pay" as political elasticity. LOL

8 in 10 hospital bills cost less than $100 in cash payment

SIGNIFICANT SUBSIDIES for hospitalization bills in subsidised wards.

The Government provides 𝐬𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐢𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐬𝐮𝐛𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐮𝐩 𝐭𝐨 𝟖𝟎% for both the surgical procedure and daily hospital charges which include any number of tests, scans and rehab services which may be required as part of the treatment episode.

Medishield Life is targeted at helping patients with more costly bills.

For hospitalization involving a more complex surgical procedure, Medishield Life will cover about 15 to 20% of total bill in a subsidised ward on average while Medisave pays for about 5 to 10%. 𝐀𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐭 𝟑% 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐝 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐢𝐧 𝐜𝐚𝐬𝐡.

For example, an average subsidised bill for a heart artery by-pass surgery - a much more complex surgery - could cost probably about $33,000 before subsidy where MediShield Life pays for about $7,300, MediSave covers about $1600 and the patient pays for the remainder of about $200 cash.

So the bulk of it is still taken care of by subsidies.

So overall, for all treatments including less complex surgeries, 8 in 10 subsidised hopitalisation bills incurred by Singaporeans cost $100 or less in cash.

Don't attempt to modify the TraceTogether token!

There have been reports of people attempting to modify the TraceTogether tokens to avoid tracking.

We are intelligent enough to understand how TraceTogether works. So we need not be misled by misinformation alleging state surveillance.

The TraceTogether token does not have any Internet or cellular connectivity, so it does not capture your locations.

It captures data via Bluetooth. The data stays with you in the token unless you test positive for COVID-19, in which case you will have to surrender the data in your token for fast contact tracing of people in close proximity with you.

Data 25-days old are purged as they would be irrelevant and useless.

TraceTogether has helped to speed up contact tracing and keep Singapore.

Don't sabotage Singapore!

Why would the minimum wage be politicised and not the Progressive Wage Model which also has a minimum wage as its first rung?

Why would the minimum wage be politicised and not the Progressive Wage Model which also has a minimum wage as its first rung?

Because the minimum wage is arbitrarily set by a political party.

The Progressive Wage Model on the other hand is negotiated through a tedious process involving consultations, walking the ground to understand the needs, negotiations with unions and industry representatives before the minimum wage is set at a level agreed upon by all, taking into considerations all needs and circumstances.

Dear Pritam Singh, your cleaners are among the 32,000 earning less than $1300 a month

It's taken too long to roll out the Progressive Wage Model. 32,000 is not a small number. It's simply not acceptable that any Singaporean earn less than $1300 a month.

Thus have WP Chief Pritam Singh argued in Parliament.

"And if we can do something about it in double quick time, let's do it," said Pritam Singh.

Well, among the 32,000 earning less than $1300 are the cleaners from Mr Pritam's Town Council.

There is something that WP can do in double quick time and reduce the number of workers earning less than $1300.

And that is, pay their cleaners according to the PWM. $1442 a month.

Pritam Singh complained that the Progressive Wage Model had taken too long to be rolled out. Yet, his cleaners are not even paid according the the PWM already rolled out for the cleaning sector.

Workers' Party pays their town council cleaners less than $1300

In a video shared by Sure Boh Singapore, a cleaner employed by AHTC said that he is paid $1200 a month before CPF deduction.

This is lower that WP's proposed $1300 min take-home wage.

It is also lower than the minimum wage of $1442 for town council cleaners under the Progressive Wage Model. Underpaid!

Given how WP had argued about a moral imperative to pay workers a minimum take-home pay of $1300, and how it is unacceptable and not justifiable to pay workers any less than $1300, Workers' Party should 𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐤 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐤.

𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐫𝐬' 𝐏𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐲 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐦𝐢𝐧𝐢𝐦𝐮𝐦 𝐰𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐢𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐫𝐨𝐥 𝐭𝐨 𝐝𝐨 𝐬𝐨.

A minimum take-home pay of $1300 means a gross pay of $1625 (for a worker 55 and younger) or $1900 inclusive of employer's CPF contribution.

You don't need to wait for a min wage law.

Ref for video mentioned:

https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=345446113191368

The future of jobs and Jamus Lim

The Future of Jobs Report by the World Economic Forum is out. The pace of technology adoption will remain unabated. It will transform tasks, jobs and skills by 2025.

By 2025, work will be divided equally between humans and machines. This shift in the division of labour means 85 million jobs displaced.

97 million new roles may emerge that are more adapted to the new division of labour between humans, machines and algorithms.

And yes, that means training for new skills.

Don't believe it when politicians come along and promise you the easy way.

Like Jamus Lim telling you that good jobs are jobs that you want, jobs that pay well, jobs that don't require you train for new skills beyond school. These are election rhetoric. Empty words.

During the election, Jamus Lim said in a political broadcast:

"I wish to express how important it is that our government doesn’t just promise us jobs, but good jobs. .. Too many of the promised jobs fail to meet up to our expectations,... because they call for us to have skills that the educational system did not provide to us."

With the fast pace of technological change, you either skill-up or be replaced. This is especially so for low wage workers where machines and robots can take over easily.

The answer is not a minimum wage. The answer is how you can stay employed so that you will earn a wage.

When a politician calls for a minimum wage for you while making light of skill-training, you know he does not make sense.