I don't usually agree with his views, but this article really struck a chord with me.
Beyond going through the usual points on the matter he brought up the issue of the moral authority of a government to lead a country through thick and thin. His article is as follows (copied in full for archive purposes too):
Sadness over Ministerial Salary Increase
Ben asked the KTM why he said the debate over the impeding salary increase is sad. The KTM collected his thoughts and realized that it is sad for a number of reasons.
The KTM explains his sadness....
Cracks in the System
Governance is complicated. There are no right answers in public policy. Policy policy is always a trade-off in between various competing demands. The role of the administrators is to balance the competing demands and to decide on a course of action that is most beneficial to the greater good. While the definition of the greater good is often contentious, but someone has to make the call. In almost every policy, someone will get screwed over. To put it bluntly, the administrators get to decide who to screw over. How pleasant a job is that? :-(
In this light, it's tough. There are times where we will need to adopt tough and unpopular policies. The common man may not appreciate and/or understand why something has to be done (because many issues in governance are significantly more complex than what's commonly accessible), but what has to be done, has to be done. While the KTM still hasn't completely understood the rationale for increasing the GST by 2% to change the underlying taxation system, he can persuaded that perhaps the GST is good for the economy and it will lead to greater growth and thereby there will be trickle down effects and the Government can do some re-distribution to cushion the impact on the poor. Yeah, the middle class fellas get squeezed a bit, but tough luck.
The point here is the following: in order for the Government to push through tough policies, it does require moral authority, like it or not. The present pay increase is certainly a tough policy to sell as well --- but it's really cannot be compared to GST in the same breath. The Government says that without pegging the pay of the Ministers and top civil servants to the riches fellas in Singapore, the Government will collapse because all the talent will leave. While the KTM has been criticized for being pro-PAP, even the KTM doesn't buy this argument.
As PCK will say, "got no blain huh? People are still pissed that you just rammed through a 2% increase in GST down their throats and now you want to raise your own pay?" Brilliant. Such sensitivity. Lim Swee Say said recently that there's no good time to raise Ministerial salaries. The KTM thinks he's right. He also said there's no bad time to raise salaries. The KTM thinks that's bogus. If we need to give out medals for brilliance in choosing a bad time, the Government deserves a truckload.
And what's the worst thing about this brouhaha? This salary problem really isn't a big national crisis or concern at all in the KTM's opinion. We are facing significant challenges in terms of globalization, in how to revamp our education system, in managing issues of aging and healthcare, etc. etc. But no, we're wasting time getting all distracted over this one stupid issue.
Realistically, the total increases represents quite an insignificant portion of the Budget. Politically, it is a HUGE emotional problem with the masses. Ministers starving huh? Children got no money to go to school izzit? Why piss off practically the whole population over this?
Lousy Reasons
The claim here is that without the proposed increases, more AOs and talented Ministers will leave the Government to join the private sector. However, only the MR4 benchmark has really gone up. The SR9 benchmark has remained relatively stable. In fact, the SR9 benchmark is lower now than that in year 2000. Er, this means that the young AOs will actually be getting lower pay soon isn't it? Unless they are thinking of changing the SR9 benchmark. Are they?
Now, if they claim that the increase in pay is to keep talent, then there must be proof that pay is what is keeping people from leaving. There have been reports of young AOs quitting and getting cushy jobs outside. Good for them. Perhaps proves that the AOs are not as useless as some claim, but doesn't prove that pay is a factor either.
If you listen to what the young ex-AOs say about why they leave, NONE of them said anything about not being paid enough what. The KTM hasn't quite done his homework, so people are welcome to quote ex-AOs who left because of better pay and prove him wrong.
Next question: are the old fellows who are near the MR4 benchmark leaving the Admin Service in droves? How many Ministers have we seen in recent times quit to join the private sector because they didn't have enough to eat? Public policy must be made based on evidence. Please show us the data so that we can believe.
Lousy Benchmark?
The KTM has no quarrels with the SR9 benchmark. He actually thinks it's reasonable. What seems to be a problem is the MR4 benchmark. Why is it a problem? Well, many reasons, but let's talk about a glaring one which dunno why nobody seemed to have picked out.
It turns out that although the benchmark has been set, the actual number that is used to compute MR4 has never actually been AT the benchmark for a long time..... which is why there's supposedly a need to play catch up now. This begs the question: how come like that? Given the army of scholars and engineers we have in the Government, why can we not come up with a benchmark that we can just follow every year. Why are we wasting time arguing over this year in year out? Not tired huh?
If the claim is that it was not political viable to follow the benchmark, then isn't it obvious that there's something seriously wrong with the current method of benchmarking and that perhaps we should go back to the drawing board and come up with a new one so that we can avoid wasting time in the future? Are our politicians very free, got no better Bills to pass and like to talk about pay?
The KTM is baffled that people can invent a formula that cannot be used. If the intention was to come up with a benchmark that yields bigger numbers and then adopt a smaller number to demonstrate "sacrifice" on the part of the Ministers, then the KTM must say that this strategy isn't working well at all. It isn't working period.
Truthfully, we shouldn't expect the Ministerial salaries to stay constant and the pay should be adjusted for inflation and perhaps even GST(!), but the KTM believes that this pegging to the richest dudes in the country is something that many Singaporeans seriously cannot stomach.
Singaporeans Should Decide How Much to Pay their Leaders
People say that Singapore is run like Singapore Inc. The KTM actually doesn't have any real issues with that. Efficiency is actually not a bad thing -- though our public service often takes the concept of "cost recovery" to the extremes.
However hor, even in companies, the management doesn't anyhow humtum their own pay when their shareholders are screaming away. Point here: even companies aren't run quite the same way and it's scary to say the least.
The free market economist in the KTM says:
The whole point about salary should really be about "how much is this job worth"? KTM believes in the free market. Singaporeans should be able to decide how much the want to pay their political leaders. If they pay too little and they get monkeys, that's their choice.But seriously, the KTM doesn't believe that Singaporeans are unreasonable and truly want monkeys on the cheap. The existing numbers for example have generally been accepted, so why can't the Government be more sensitive? Or politically savvy?
The Sadness
Why is the KTM sad? He looks at what's happening and he is seriously concerned. Things are really not going well. It feels like the society is descending into chaos(?).
But the really sad part is, it doesn't have to be this way.
We are small and we are insignificant and we are a little red dot. Against all odds, we have come a long way and we can be proud of our achievements. BUT, the future is really not a bed of roses. If, as a country, we cannot get our act together, we have nowhere to go, but down. :-(
Pragmatism aside, a Government needs moral authority. Without that authority, how can it lead the people in facing the challenges of tomorrow? It's not "talent" that we need in Government today, we need leadership.
To conclude, let's play the Devil's advocate. Let's say the Government is right and we are grossly underpaying these Ministers and civil servants. Nevertheless, it should be clear that increasing pay, reduces moral authority to lead --- and therefore, in the grand scheme, boh pian just have to make that "sacrifice". Maybe every one just serve one five-year NS term and then move on to the private sector to make their big bucks loh. It's not clear to the KTM that we have anyone so incredibile bright and indispensible around.
Perhaps the KTM is being excessively pessimistic today.... There are good days and there are bad days. Maybe tomorrow will be a better day. Or maybe not.
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