garry blogs

Though we do not have economic indicators for Switzerland in 1984, we have the figures in 2009 and it appears that Singapore is heading towards a Russian standard of living, rather than Switzerland’s.

Let us compare the indices for each category:

                                                                             Singapore        Moscow         Zurich

Wage level:                                                         31.3                   30.9                    119.8

Domestic purchasing power:                          39.9                   49.4                   106.9

Working time to puy iPod nano:                      27.5                   36.0                   9.0

Price of services:                                              72.5                   65.0                   110.9

 

As the above figures have shown, the Singapore worker has more in common with the Russian worker than a Swiss worker.

Like the Russian worker, the Singapore worker has low wages and domestic purchasing power which is aggravated by the relatively high cost of living in their respective countries.

In fact, the Russian worker has a higher domestic purchasing power than the Singaporean worker though his wage is slightly lower. And don’t forget Russia is a vast country. If one cannot survive in Moscow, they can move to the countryside where cost of living is lower. There is nowhere for Singaporeans to move to.

This is an interesting (although I feel a bit biased) article done by The Temasek Review.

We’re doing worse off than the Russians!