21–30 of 262 posts
Disagree on calling Suzhou Industrial Park a failure. I grew up there and can say that while it may not have attracted the desired profit levels it certainly did have miraculous effect on the people of Suzhou. Wages have sky rocketed (as has property price). It may not have been profitable within 5 years, more than 400 fortune 500 companies had their factories located there in 2014. Suzhou went from a city with two b…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's right, we tend to label every successful economy "capitalism", but actually if you look at Singapore there's some things that are not so obviously free market. Housing, for instance.
Gotta say, housing is one good that the free market seems to not really be amazing at. Here in Australia, it has become an investment vehicle; a huge amount of housing stock is empty while a third of the population are living in very poor accommodation.
Which is a pity, really. IMO housing policy should target property prices to follow inflation.
I lived 2 years in Singapore as an exchange student. The economic success of Singapore is a relatively new phenomenon, and it was largely a doing of Lee jr., not Lee sr. LKY was not well versed in matters of economics, and industry, and his forceful early industrialisation pushes failed miserably. For the bigger half of its history, Singapore was not that successful economically. The money came to Singapore when it l…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's right, we tend to label every successful economy "capitalism", but actually if you look at Singapore there's some things that are not so obviously free market. Housing, for instance.
Gotta say, housing is one good that the free market seems to not really be amazing at. Here in Australia, it has become an investment vehicle; a huge amount of housing stock is empty while a third of the population are living in very poor accommodation.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's right, we tend to label every successful economy "capitalism", but actually if you look at Singapore there's some things that are not so obviously free market. Housing, for instance.
Gotta say, housing is one good that the free market seems to not really be amazing at. Here in Australia, it has become an investment vehicle; a huge amount of housing stock is empty while a third of the population are living in very poor accommodation.
Most developed countries don't even have anything close to a Free Market anyway, with restrictions on the construction of new housing, zoning, and rent controls in many places.
Singapore's population is very conservative, e.g. live with parents until marry, homosexuality is illegal, a lot of pressure against interracial couples (my experience), and essentially a single, dominant media voice. There is a militant approach to education which produces nice test results, but it doesn't produce young entrepreneurs, just conservative careers, helped by statutory hiring quotas. I don't think the Si…
They also have a very important geographical position as a hub to many other Asian countries, and one of the few countries friendly to foreign investments in the area (even more so now that HK is going down).
I lived 2 years in Singapore as an exchange student. The economic success of Singapore is a relatively new phenomenon, and it was largely a doing of Lee jr., not Lee sr. LKY was not well versed in matters of economics, and industry, and his forceful early industrialisation pushes failed miserably. For the bigger half of its history, Singapore was not that successful economically. The money came to Singapore when it l…
LKY ruled from 1959-1990. Singapore's GDP over that time grew at a 14% compound annual growth rate: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/SGP/singapore/gdp-gros... .
Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's right, we tend to label every successful economy "capitalism", but actually if you look at Singapore there's some things that are not so obviously free market. Housing, for instance.
Gotta say, housing is one good that the free market seems to not really be amazing at. Here in Australia, it has become an investment vehicle; a huge amount of housing stock is empty while a third of the population are living in very poor accommodation.
House prices in Australia are driven by two forces - immigration and monetary policy (ie, interest rates).
Neither of those drivers are linked to a free market. The equilibrium in both is set by government decree (immigration numbers) and interest rates are set by the RBA (effectively part of the government bureaucracy) to a first approximation.
The government doesn't have an explicit policy of pushing up house prices, but there is a very strong implicit policy to the same effect. Giving them more direct control over housing wouldn't change much.
Ask some of the million poorly paid foreign workers what they think of the success of Singapore - I'm sure the story won't be quite as glowing.