200 SMRT bus drivers refuse to go to work over pay issue
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Twinkies:
It might be overly simplistic to dismiss the concept of nationalisation on the basis that it is incompatible with capitalistic ideals. And it has nothing to do with whether a nation is \"educated\" or not. The key argument against nationalisation is that it tends to lead to poorer performance in the long run, given the lack of incentives to exceed prescribed quality levels, since the organisation will not be profit driven.... According to some of you, the idealized state is much like asking the state to do a welfare transport system, no fare adjustment according to the inflation.
Should the public transport system being run with the welfare format, the tax payers are to foot the bill. Will it be fair? To those that rely on public transport they may find it agreeable, but to others who don't, what's your say?
This is something almost unheard of, a nation of highly educated people, asking for nationalization of their public transport which many countries had abolished since the 70s.
Need I say more about the pros n cons of privatization n nationalization?
Are we moving backward?
What are we?
Where are we?
On the other hand, we have seen market failures happening at macro levels. The world is still suffering from the after effects of the subprime mortgage problem which was a clear example of the dangers of the lack of regulatory control and laissez faire capitalisation. Fully unregulated transport companies in places like Sri Lanka openly fought with each other over the right to run lucrative routes. No profit-oriented company want to run routes which are less populated, which means people staying in those areas will have no access to public transport.
In fact, public transport in Singapore is largely nationalised. The government builds and owns the railway tracks. It even owns the trains that run on the tracks. This is all funded through tax - money from you and me. The government selects the private operator to run their infrastructure. It has the right to take punitive action or even change the operator if it fails to perform and meet minimum performance standards. And who owns the private operator SMRT? Temasek Holdings - the government's main investment arm - owns over 50% of SMRT. So is the government not already running our public MRT system?
The idea is: we as tax payers pay for the building of the public transport infrastructure. We pay for our individual use of the public transport infrastructure. And if SMRT do well, we should, in theory, get better returns for our money in CPF.
The last statement, however, is not actually the case. As account holders, we don't earn more profit even if the investments made with our money are highly profitable. Herein lies the crux of the issue. As citizens, we are already paying for the public transport infrastructure through taxes and we have to pay for the cost of our individual rides. We do not benefit directly from the profits made by the transport companies. There is, therefore, a moral expectation that public transport, being a public good, should be made accessible and available to every citizen, and hence fares must remain low.
The question of whether the government should subsidize public transport has already been answered. It is already subsidizing through its investment in public transport infrastructure. The real question is whether the government should implement even more creative ways of using taxpayer's money to keep public transport prices affordable even to the poorest segment of our citizenry. -
3Boys:
Perhaps you could explain to me the economics of rising raw materials, rental, yet hawkers asked to maintain their selling price and not raise them? We don't even talk about engaging workers. Just the boss managing the biz himself, and doing this for the last decades, not living extravagantly, just for a living. How? Using this as a simpler example so that commoner like me can better understand. If the same is asked of these people, why can't the people expect smarter people to be able to do it? Please explain. And here we have people being free spokes person for a private listed company, yet no one fighting to speak up for these folks - who also most likely need to take public transport.
No, dun need money.
Ask Volvo and Mercedes to give us buses for free, ok?
You find some friends and volunteer to go drive buses for free, ok?
It's ok as long as its someone else's money.
Living in dreamland.
Living in dreamland? I cannot afford to. -
concern2:
I support hawkers raising their prices in the face of rising costs. It is part of this high-wage/high-tax/high-cost model that Singaporeans are now clamouring for, often unknowingly. And if you look around, hawkers HAVE raised their prices.
Perhaps you could explain to me the economics of rising raw materials, rental, yet hawkers asked to maintain their selling price and not raise them? We don't even talk about engaging workers. Just the boss managing the biz himself, and doing this for the last decades, not living extravagantly, just for a living. How? Using this as a simpler example so that commoner like me can better understand. If the same is asked of these people, why can't the people expect smarter people to be able to do it? Please explain.3Boys:
No, dun need money.
Ask Volvo and Mercedes to give us buses for free, ok?
You find some friends and volunteer to go drive buses for free, ok?
It's ok as long as its someone else's money.
Living in dreamland.
I suppose if one expects the bus drivers to continue to 'not live extravagantly' on low wages, then your approach is ok.
But if one says \"Pay higher wages to drivers so that Singaporeans can have those jobs and still have a reasonable lifestyle\" (I support this notion, by the way), then your entire premise falls apart, does it not, if it's predicated on \"people\" (includes everyone, execs down to workers) \"not living extravagantly\". -
ChiefKiasu:
The real question is whether the government should implement even more creative ways of using taxpayer's money to keep public transport prices affordable even to the poorest segment of our citizenry.
Chief, in another thread, we had already discussed affordability. It is affordable for the big majority of commuters. Our fares are not that high compared regionally and internationally.
For the small percentage for which transportation make up a bigger proportion of costs of living (10% of households perhaps, depending how you cut off), my belief is that direct subsidies and grants to these families are far more effective than tweaking our entire transportation model to cater cost-wise to them. -
ruohoo97:
+1:goodpost:
:goodpost:Twinkies:
Nationalize the public transport won't solve the labour crunch problem, the reliance of foreign labour will still be the way to go.....
Nationalize or not, won't make much difference, unless the resentment echoed here is about the transport fare, rather than the foreign labour and the strike.
Looks like some people misunderstood the situation. To continue enjoy the affordable fare, we need the foreign labour to keep the overhead low. Has anyone having any problem understanding this simple economic bacics?
(I read somewhere in this forum, a $3000 and above salary for bus driver was proposed... and, is it the same people asking to keep the fare low and unchanged for the next decade?)
According to some of you, the idealized state is much like asking the state to do a welfare transport system, no fare adjustment according to the inflation.
Should the public transport system being run with the welfare format, the tax payers are to foot the bill. Will it be fair? To those that rely on public transport they may find it agreeable, but to others who don't, what's your say?
This is something almost unheard of, a nation of highly educated people, asking for nationalization of their public transport which many countries had abolished since the 70s.
Need I say more about the pros n cons of privatization n nationalization?
Are we moving backward?
What are we?
Where are we?
I really can't understand all the clamouring to nationalise the transport system.
I mean, do we REALLY want to turn ALL our bus drivers into civil servants??
:?
How does that improve service delivery or costs, hidden or otherwise? -
3Boys:
I support hawkers raising their prices in the face of rising costs.
Perhaps you could explain to me the economics of rising raw materials, rental, yet hawkers asked to maintain their selling price and not raise them? We don't even talk about engaging workers. Just the boss managing the biz himself, and doing this for the last decades, not living extravagantly, just for a living. How? Using this as a simpler example so that commoner like me can better understand. If the same is asked of these people, why can't the people expect smarter people to be able to do it? Please explain.concern2:
[quote=\"3Boys\"]
No, dun need money.
Ask Volvo and Mercedes to give us buses for free, ok?
You find some friends and volunteer to go drive buses for free, ok?
It's ok as long as its someone else's money.
Living in dreamland.
I suppose if one expects the bus drivers to continue to 'not live extravagantly' on low wages, then your approach is ok.
But if one says \"Pay higher wages to drivers so that Singaporeans can have those jobs and still have a reasonable lifestyle\" (I support this notion, by the way), then your entire premise falls apart, does it not, if it's predicated on \"people\" (includes everyone, execs down to workers) \"not living extravagantly\".[/quote]My point on equality and expectations and desperations of the people has been expressed in my post. You are reasonable, so I shall not dwell on this issue further.
My sentiments towards the general public outcry in fare rise is this:
Public Transport is one of the basic needs as people need to travel to work. I don't see there is anything wrong in pressurizing the authorities to come up with better solutions and also found it disappointing that this is the best solution they can come up with.
People are coming up with different ideas because they have been asked numerous of times: \"So what is your solution?\" Isn't this ironic? Or is this pure politics?
So now when they try to provide their solutions, they are mocked to be 'experts'?! What,now they want to 'shut' the 'noise' again? This is what the 'educated' and 'knowledgable people' and 'smart' people who earns millions of dollars can come up with? Shoving back at its people? (not targeting at 3Boys). -
MR06:
limlim, your own brew not aromatic enough and want to be invited to lim kopi izzit? :nailbite:
They learnt fast.. that strike is effective method to get the message across..limlim:
[quote=\"phtthp\"]first strike is SMRT
now 2nd strike is crane operator
next 3rd strike ?
Maybe locals should learn from them too..?
[/quote]Strike approved by union chief is legal.. :evil:
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limlim:
My response to your questions:And, to those who feel that using tax money to pay for public transport is unfair..
Will you feel better if the public transport is sub-standard and many pple are driven to drive and you got to share the road with 100x more cars on the road? sounds good? jams from one end to the other end of the express way.. you like?
Or would you rather public transport be improved such that pple are encouraged to take it and you can zip thru the roads with ease as pple give up on cars and less pple to compete with you for road space?
What say you?
I do not want a sub-standard public transport.
I rather our public transport be improved.
But are you saying the above are better achieved when the public transport system is nationalized? I am not challenging you, just curious if anyone has some data to show some comparisons between the 2 models.
I agree public transport is an important basic service which should be supported by tax money. However, the best way of spending that tax money is not so straight forward. The answer could very well be a hybrid model with both direct and indirect investment/subsidies. Personally, I don't think nationalizing our public transport system is the best approach. On the other hand, I think the government could provide more transport subsidies, for example, to needy families and senior citizens. -
ChiefKiasu:
I would like to comment on the part in bold.
It might be overly simplistic to dismiss the concept of nationalisation on the basis that it is incompatible with capitalistic ideals. And it has nothing to do with whether a nation is \"educated\" or not. The key argument against nationalisation is that it tends to lead to poorer performance in the long run, given the lack of incentives to exceed prescribed quality levels, since the organisation will not be profit driven.
I don't see why a privatized, profit driven company holding a monopoly will have \"incentive\" to exceed prescribed quality levels, when their foremost priority is profit, which may not be correlated to \"quality of service\".
Hence, the argument that privatized company can delivery better quality is flawed. Althou I have no doubts of it being more efficient at generating profits. Not forgetting that a large part of the profits goes into a few deep pockets.
On the other hand, nationalised companies can also be driven to delivery better quality if the KPIs are correctly planned out for the key appointment holders, even if they are not as efficient in generating profits. -
In order to make bus drivers happier and hopefully avoid future strikes, bus fares wil be increased :roll:
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