Expect growth to slow, says Tharman

[karlmarx]

hmm, i agree. but i think lao lee's smile is the scariest (because he hardly does!).

but i understand why you said that. communism is still a dirty word even today (especially in sg). it remains extremely misunderstood, ever since lee grabbed power in 1963 and rounded up his communist comrades. to persuade people of the evils of communism, they are feed mental images of third world countries like russia, cuba, cambodia or vietnam, characterized by poor living standards, authoritarian governments, lack of human rights, no free press, and a police state. wait, doesn't this sound like someplace very close to our hearts?

what's that? only leaders of third world countries abuse power and enjoy great wealth while its people suffer? hmm...

granted, we don't eat out of mess tins, but communism is an instinct that is closer to us than we would readily admit.

for one, singaporeans have been asking for slower growth, more equitable distribution of wealth, lower hdb prices, lower medical costs, lower transportation costs, and some say limit the number of cars per household, or allow household with families preferential access to COEs. the clamour for a more socialist approach to the everyday issues has a positive correlation to the rise in the gini coefficient.

you will find it hard not to find elements of capitalism or communism in communist and capitalist states, respectively. it is impossible to divorce the two and organise your society according to only one set of principles and not lead to certain imbalances. why would it make sense to go to war even though you do not fully practice the principals you're fighting for, or worse, adopt the principals of your enemies?

owners of capital always seek to generate returns. thus capital will always be looking for markets where they may be put to use. what happens when you've run out of markets? guess which country has been invading 'communist' countries since the 50s, has the largest corporations, and has the highest number of billionaires and millionaires.

if you break it down, communism comes from community. and aren't we all communal-loving people?

[mrEngineer]

China with its state owned companies may be a new model to look up to for communism to succeed.

[kazukirai]

China with its state owned companies may be a new model to look up to for communism to succeed.

I highly doubt it.

The SOEs have a lot of souring debt on their books due to them being inefficiently run. This in turn is translating to high levels of NPLs on China's Big 4 banks books. The way out (and they did this before during the slowdown after the Asian Financial Crisis) is to load all the bad debt into a bad bank and clean out the big banks. It's a right pocket to left pocket kind of transaction and the ones that suffer are the households as household consumption gets repressed.

Another Communist country with such SOEs in trouble is Vietnam. So far, the state directed model hasn't turned out too well. Singapore, ironically, may be one of the more successful ones at state-directed investments (using the GLCs but even that's arguable) but even then we've had our fair share of blow-ups (such as Chartered semi-con) and look how our bio-medical initiatives are going so far...One might argue that it's our private sector openess that's helped.

I think China's model as a success story for communism is far from a forgone conclusion.

[yeokiwi]

Chartered semi-con - If we look at the current semiconductor industry that Singapore is having, CSM might worth the money that we put in.

FY2010(in millions)
Integrated circuits 27,187.1
HDD 5,472.6
PC parts 12,884.6

bio-medical initiatives
FY2010(in millions)
Pharmaceutical Products 19,039.5

In terms of value added, Pharmaceutical Products at 9.7 billions is the highest.

http://www.singstat.gov.sg/pubn/referenc...turing.pdf

The total impact of both industries are much higher since they will generate demands for other industries.

[Jared Seah]

Hello Karlmarx,

I really appreciate your sharing. I've learnt a lot.

I too have grappled with what I would have been if I would be in my twenties in the 50s and 60s:

http://singaporemanofleisure.blogspot.co...ammer.html

I didn't say it outright, but my hint was that if I had been chinese educated, I would probably be living in "Tekong or Sentosa", or maybe exiled.

Only when I was in secondary school did my mom tell me that I actually had a maternal uncle that was exiled to China in the 60s (before I was born in 67) due to his past chinese school student protests and communist leanings... Yup, my parents were invited to have coffee with ISA. When I found out, it was like wow!

It's not easy to grapple with my heart and brain. The brain says get financially free, don't rock the boat, take care of yourself first - be the establishment. But the heart yearns for more social justice and fairness - however, I know it's just empty talk talk until I sign up with one of the parties.

[karlmarx]

thank you, your blog is a very nice read as well.

i share the same dilemma as you. having met some of the 'crazy' (as the press would have you believe) members of the opposition bloc, i felt that i'm truly living among giants. epiphanies such as these lead me to question my objective of accumulating tons (figuratively) of wealth; so much money, buy what?

i believe people who are into value investing (or whatever form of investing), are somewhat financially literate to cultivate good financial habits such as saving regularly. they also tend to have a good sum of money, or a good income generator (jobs), that enables them to invest. so if you ask me, i think being an investor, you are already financially more stable and would have little problem in providing a modest living for yourself and your family.

which leads us to two question: what would you do with all that (extra) money that's bursting out of your refrigerator? and what would you choose to do with your life, given your financial security? these are of course, big questions, but nonetheless important to deal with.

so, jared, since you feel so strongly towards financial security and social justice, perhaps you can continue building your stock/cash portfolio, and spend your dividends on buying foodstuffs for the folks living in 1-rm flats. that is, if you feel being a part of opposition parties is too much to bear!

[kazukirai]

Chartered semi-con - If we look at the current semiconductor industry that Singapore is having, CSM might worth the money that we put in.

FY2010(in millions)
Integrated circuits 27,187.1
HDD 5,472.6
PC parts 12,884.6

bio-medical initiatives
FY2010(in millions)
Pharmaceutical Products 19,039.5

In terms of value added, Pharmaceutical Products at 9.7 billions is the highest.

http://www.singstat.gov.sg/pubn/referenc...turing.pdf

The total impact of both industries are much higher since they will generate demands for other industries.

Hi Yeo-san,

I was thinking more of the bio-research driven by state agencies for e.g. A-Star, where we create incentives for private businesses to come and set up shop here, I wouldn't have considered them SOEs. Ok maybe these aren't SOEs either so bad classification.

As for CSM, it might have had knock-on effects in the industry but would that have been the best use of $?

After all, CSM was a govt-directed effort, it later also raised money from equity holders and that's where the losses would have impacted. So the output from the electronic manufacturing sector will need to be balanced by these losses to see the nett impact. Maybe it will prove that CSM was a good bet on a macro level but CSM was still loss-making quasi-SOE. Why couldn't this quasi-SOE become a world-beater?

Which brings me back to the original question- is it possible for SOEs to operate efficiently/profitably such that it may be a model to be held in regard rather than the many SOE examples that somehow end up doing badly?

I may have gotten some points wrong. All clarification and views welcome.

[weijian]

As for CSM, it might have had knock-on effects in the industry but would that have been the best use of $?

As someone from the semiconductor industry, on hindsight, i would say that this gov directed effort was worthed it. The worth came in the knock on effects directly related to the electronics sector:

(1) Because of the high capex and operating costs, it attracts suppliers (international ones to set up shops here, and local SMEs to flourish), which in turn creates new jobs and trade.
(2) Because of the availability of jobs, it slowly but surely built up the talent pool of engineers. (well, in the 90s and early 2000s before the whole finance craze came in). A readily skilled labour force is 1 of the main factors that new electronic firms consider whether to setup shop here.

Both (1) and (2) work in a feedback loop until the electronic sector in spore reached that critical mass to stabilize and become 'yield accretive'

[kazukirai]

As someone from the semiconductor industry, on hindsight, i would say that this gov directed effort was worthed it. The worth came in the knock on effects directly related to the electronics sector:

(1) Because of the high capex and operating costs, it attracts suppliers (international ones to set up shops here, and local SMEs to flourish), which in turn creates new jobs and trade.
(2) Because of the availability of jobs, it slowly but surely built up the talent pool of engineers. (well, in the 90s and early 2000s before the whole finance craze came in). A readily skilled labour force is 1 of the main factors that new electronic firms consider whether to setup shop here.

Both (1) and (2) work in a feedback loop until the electronic sector in spore reached that critical mass to stabilize and become 'yield accretive'

Hi Weijian,

Great to have an insider's view on this. I have a friend currently working in Semi-con and a colleague who was also previously from the semi-con industry. Both are telling me that prospects for the industry (at least in SG) are bleak, I'm not sure in what sense but I assume they mean growth and by extension, career prospects.

Is there any truth to this?

[weijian]

hi kazukirai,
In the last decade, we were blessed by inventions in the form of mp3s, canon cameras, nintendo Wiis, iphones, ipads..that kept us going. As the industry gets more competitive and other cheaper alternatives (china, msia) catches up in terms of talent pool/IP/infrastructure, i am afraid your friends have a high probablity of been right.

Global Foundaries (ex CSM) just opened a Fab in New York, and u can guess that now everyone is doing the same (in throwing out incentives) to attract such capex. Spore does nt have home grown technology nor a world beater SOE-kind fab (the likes of Samsung, Toshiba or TSMC) to keep us growing/spending.