The lawyer who feels the pain of our Ministers

A lawyer tries to put his version of the spin on the matter of ministerial pay raise via his writing - the green eyed monster.

I felt that the article was very undiplomatic - basically it’s suggesting that a significant number of the critics are jealous of the Ministers pay and are opposing the raise simply because of their jealousy.

The author believes that lawyers deserve their high pay because of 2 main factor - they really studied hard through a long, labourous process; and their work requires them to be very careful and extremely meticulous.

I think that his views are quite misplaced. Most professionals are trained over significant time - some require constant retraining even; all professionals need to be very careful and meticulous when going about their job if they want to do survive and prosper in their respective industries.

The lawyer's pay is by and large a result of demand and supply - there is demand, and limited supply. Part of the problem is that some years back our government predicted wrongly that there will be a glut of lawyers - the opposite happened, there were no enough lawyers. The supply problem is further worsened by the relatively specialized nature of the job - one cannot simply import Chinese or Indian lawyers because they are not versed with local law. My friends told me too that the pay of Singaporean lawyers lag behind many nations including China even, and that the steady leak of lawyers overseas as a result is compounding the supple issue.

This shortage is the reason why lawyers get higher pay when compared to other professions.

In the comments section of this thread, Joel Leong said...

Just my little observation/opinion.

1. Staff look forward to pay increment and market adjustment.

2. Bosses frown on staff 's pay rise. But will oblige if staff can perform well.

3. Taxpayers unhappy with Ministers' pay rise. Taxpayers still willing to vote for the Ministers if the country is doing well.

So at the end of day, if one can perform he should be duly rewarded.

anonymous craven said...

Joel Leong :

Firstly, who acts as the 'bosss' of the government? According to our constitution, the people of Singapore is supposed to be the 'boss', and surely the people's inputs should factor in when it comes to judging the performance, as well as the quantum of pay adjustments.

Following your example it will be akin to the staff deciding unilaterally that they have done a great job, and rewarding themselves with pay raises. Does it make any sense at all?

Second. Pay raises in the private sector are calibrated with whichever sector/discipline one finds themsevles in. There is no job out there where one can pay hop to to be tied to whichever sector that is doing best at that time : such a pay system is completely out of this world - its almost like a guaranteed pay raise, for so long as the top earners out there are being paid more for their efforts, you get to partake in their gains as your pay is tied relative with theirs.

Following your example it will be similar to the staff telling their boss that for that year they want their pay to be tied to banker pay as the market is doing very well this year. Can you imagine the response of the boss to such a demand?