The Wealth Windfall amidst the Pandemic.

 

There is a cold wind blowing from the pandemic front and it is the wealth windfall greatly benefiting the 1.1 per cent of the global population of 7 billion. 

Assoc Editor Vikram Khanna has written a sobering article about what this weath windfall means to the world at large. 

First, he clarifies that this is not about income inequality. Not about monthly or yearly salary differences that pricks the heart of equality. The stab is the “inequalities in wealth”, that is, “the value of financial and real assets that people own, less their liabilities.” 

Second, Vikram cited real world stats and it is an eye opener. Now, we all know about how the income/wealth gap is increasing but here are the meat in percentage terms to add to our dry bone of contention.

“It estimated that 56.1 million individuals (1.1 per cent of the adult population) each had assets worth more than US$1 million at the end of last year. Their total wealth was US$191.6 trillion.”(Credit Suisse reports last month). 

Put a mental note on 1.1 percent, accumulated total wealth of US$191.6 trillion, with more than US$1 million. Now, how does the rest compare?

“By comparison, 2.9 billion individuals - 55 per cent of all adults in the world - each had wealth below US$10,000. Their total wealth was US$5.5 trillion.”

Vikram concludes: “In other words, the top 1.1 per cent, which holds almost half of all the wealth in the world, had about 35 times the wealth of the bottom 55 per cent.”

That’s not all. Let’s granularise it. 

Singapore, amongst other economically advanced economies like UK, Belgium and Canada, suffered high GDP losses of 7.1%, yet the “high wealth gains averaging 7.7 percent, net of exchange rate consideration.” 

And this is what they mean when they say, the rich are getting richer, or the wealthy has gotten wealthier. 

As for our endearing billionaires, their net wealth has soared 55%, from US$2.95 trillion to US$4.56 trillion.

The cause? 

Well, according to reports, it’s governmental policies, reacting indiscriminately to the pandemic crisis, by flooding the economy with money, which the wealthy immediately capitalises. Vikram puts it this way: -

“The US Federal Reserve and other major central banks slashed interest rates and expanded their asset purchases, flooding the markets with liquidity. Huge fiscal expansions followed. This led to stock market rallies, particularly in the US, where the Standard & Poor's index jumped 16 per cent, with most of the gain concentrated in technology stocks.”

This is what it means by the catchphrase “winners take all, and losers, well, they suck it up.”

The article also goes on to talk about the recent global wealth tax of 15%, with its many drawbacks, and a novel and audacious proposal to tax on companies’ stock at 0.2%. 

They make for a very interesting read and you can read it when you are free. But I’d leave all that for a condensed lesson about the larger scheme of things. 

Lesson. Admittedly, it is hard not to envy the wealthy and famous. In a world where whatever they do comes to your screen at a touch of a button, you will need to be shanghai’ed away into an hermitage in some faraway land to remain oblivious about their heavily advertised opulence and extravagant lifestyles. 

Imagine this, and as Vikram puts it, “as the wealthy got wealthier during the pandemic, hundreds of millions of middle class and the poor got poorer, having lost their jobs and livelihoods, or were furloughed. The World Bank and other multilateral agencies estimate that at least 100 million people either remained poor or were pushed into poverty last year. During the worst of the pandemic, the vast majority of the world's workforce that could not work remotely had the stark choice of either staying at home and earning nothing or going out to work and putting their lives at risk.”

Well, I have been telling myself about contentment, and that is still relevant, if not more so, but at some point, I will be forced to think not just about the wealth gap, but the humanity gap, that is, with so much wealth in their hands, are we then no different from the time of kings and princes, aristocrats and barons in the feudal states between the 9th and 15th centuries? 

Aren’t we then back full circle with the ironic aid of meritocracy, meant initially for the common good, with a big push from the advancement of enlightened knowledge and civilization? 

Question is, if meritocracy, like democracy, is the best flawed system amongst the worst, and the issue is about how to improve it, rather than eradicating it completely, are we catching a glimpse of an evolving or fully evolved system where the one (that is, 1.1%) who directly or indirectly pays the piper (Govt) calls the shot (policy decisions)? 

Another way of putting it is this - “We can have a democratic society or we can have the concentration of great wealth in the hands of a few. We cannot have both” (Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis). 

And I think we cannot have both because anything that concentrates changes the character of that thing. The concentration of great wealth in the hands of the 1.1% threatens to not only deeply divide society, but elevates the handful to godlike status. 

I suspect there is a foreboding dehumanising effect on the handful, not all though, as the advancement and protection of their immense wealth takes on a possessive and an obsessive hold. Of course, the other 55% (or more) is not immune from such stranglehold arising from sheer deprivation and envy. 

And that is the main perplexing issue when the gap grows beyond the well-intended resolve of policy maker to close it. That widening gap therefore worsens the desperation on both sides, thereby resulting in a crisis on a whole new humanity scale. 

And taking a page of wisdom from Einstein who said, “We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them,” maybe there’s a parallel here for our meritocratic system. For we can’t solve problems from within the system that created it in the first place. 

And this may be because the political will to change is often drowned out by the power of money and its influence. Or, maybe those seeking to defend their wealth and position are using the meritocratic system to lull us into accepting or resigning to the matrix-like reality that there is really no other way except the one we have been living in, and we should all just suck it up and make the best of a far-from-ideal situation. And on a wing and a prayer, maybe things might just improve and get rosier in the distant future? 

Mm...food for thought?

 

Jeff Bezos - the Richest Man in the World.

The world’s richest man. That’s Jeff Bezos. Net worth around US$200b. The stuff that dreams are made of. But how did he get there in 27 years? By sheer will, intellect and speed of course. 

His unauthorised biographer, Brad Stone, has written two books about him. His article about the space cowboy (Bezos is retiring to embark on space exploration) surmises the techno-legend as one with “towering intellect, along with a notable deficit of empathy and fear of stasis.” 

Brad describes Amazon as this: “Today, the company is a kind of corporate apeirogon - a shape with infinite sides - extending into new industries on a regular basis, terrifying potential competitors and sending blasts of anxiety across the antitrust establishment.”

With an apeirogon, you can never visionalise its shape because it is always expanding. It multiplies at all sides, and that is how Bezos worked his way up to the top of the human achievement pyramid, enjoying unrivalled wealth. 

His work philosophy is simple. He once told journalist Walter Isaacson that “doing things at high speed, that’s the best defence against the future. If you are leaning away from the future, the future is going to win every time.”

Imagine that, you benchmark your growth not just against getting ahead of competitors, but against a future where things have yet to be invented. You therefore create a tomorrow, that is, a world you are the first to colonise and also the first to reap all the profits that comes with first-mover advantage.

That is Bezos’ philosophy, very much like that of Facebook’s Zuckerberg’s motto - “Move fast and break things.” 

For Bezos, he has coined this term - “Day 2” company. This is what he wrote to his shareholders in 2016 explaining what he meant. “Day 2 is stasis, followed by irrelevance, followed by excruciating, painful decline, followed by death. And that is why it is always Day 1.”

Bezos’ Day 1 concept of growth and innovation is the rising of many new dawns, each one like the side of an apeirogon, forever-expanding to capture brave new lands and uncharted terrestrial terrains at the speed of creative light. 

But alas, in chasing a future travelling at the breakneck speed, there is a cost attached to it. Brad wrote: -

“As the fortunes of the company and its founder have increased, their public images have taken a beating. As recent news reports show, Amazon’s workers are often pushed to the limit by arduous goals, arbitrarily changing rules and algorithmic masters, which seem to have little tolerance for human frailty.”

“”Colleagues new and old testify that he has many talents, including a superhuman ability to focus on disparate issues and get to the bottom of complex problems. But empathy was never one of them. "If you're not good, Jeff will chew you up and spit you out," a former executive once told me. "And if you're good, he will jump on your back and ride you into the ground."”

Lesson? Just one. 

Bezos’ retirement plan to travel in his Blue Origin rocket into suborbital space is the perfect metaphor of his apeirogon-like success. While the world below looks on, Bezos is blasting his way to the unbounded universe. 

First, he conquered the market. Second, he created the future. Now, he is exploring space, if not colonising planets; just in case the good old mother earth happens to heave her last breath from climate change. 

On the jaded backs of many, but no doubt duly rewarded, Bezos has rode them all. Each one up to par was given six-impossible-things-to-do-before breakfast, and like one brick after another, each task assigned and completed goes to building a rocket empire ruled by one at the top. 

At the end of the day, when the sun sets and a new dawn rises, Bezos is merely playing the game by its rules, even in uncharted territory. And all’s indeed fair in war and in love, in market and in picket. 

His relentless zeal driven by an idea fully riped for its time has borne not just fruits, but a flourishing Eden garden where he roams with the gods, figure of speech of course. 

But I guess history has seen enough of such glowing personalities from Solomon to Alexander the Great, from King Saladin to King Richard of England, and from the House of Windsor to the Rockefeller dynasty. They come and they go, each time with a bigger bang for the buck, creating endless economic and social ripples. 

Ultimately, whatever decision they make in their life, the biggest one will still be the end-of-life decision. Unfailingly, it is still about leaving your mark in this world as you take your leave eventually. And Bezos has indeed left his, that is, a mark we will find whenever we need to order things online, business acumen and innovation notwithstanding. 

Similarly, we all leave our mark on earth too, taking the same journey ending up not in a suborbital space capsule, but in one much smaller, that is, one that is just right for our body size, and no bigger. 

And when that time comes, for each and everyone of us, let’s pray that we will be remembered for doing the best we can, with whatever we have, for as long as it takes, to make a difference in what matters in the end. 

That in itself is a life worthy of its calling too, even if we don’t end up being the richest man in the world, or one of the richest.

 

Dsidain for the less educated in America.

Are we looking down on the relatively less educated? Is this the new prejudice? As more of us have a tertiary degree, or advanced degree, are those without, merely armed with a diploma, less of value, character and worth? 

It is ironic that the one who wrote the article - “Disdain for the less educated is the last acceptable prejudice” - is a highly respected, well known, and eminently educated professor from, well, you guessed it, Harvard...where else right?

But what Michael J. Sandel has to say is a message of great urgency and importance to us all, not just Americans, but worldwide, especially the economically advanced nations. 

Professor Sandel started his illuminating article with this reminder: “Mr Joe Biden has a secret weapon in his bid for the United States presidency: He is the first Democratic nominee in 36 years without a degree from an Ivy League university.” 

Considering that “in the US Congress, 95 per cent of House members and 100 per cent of senators are college graduates”, academically bland Joe is the black swan in a predominantly educated white swan Congress. 

When it comes to prejudice, there is a growing gap between the credentialed and the uncredentialed, and looking at the statistics in US Congress, it is obvious that we live in a world where “the credentialed few govern the uncredentialed many.” 

Now let’s not be naive, you can’t avoid prejudices in this world we live in. We are somehow hardwired to pigeonhole people of diverse backgrounds into categories to make it easier to precast, prejudge, and prejudice. 

We may be reminded not to judge a person by the colour of his skin nor the gender or nation she’s born in, but when it comes to education, we are fast dividing the world into those who have degree and those who have not. Even amongst those who have degree, we further divide them into those who have degree from ivy league schools and those who have degree from community colleges.

That is why in America, one of the leading causes of despair resulting in suicide is when one is being left behind just because he or she does not have a degree. For them, there is just no chance of upward mobility. For them, there is no chance of competing with those who have better education. And for them, the American dream has mutated into an American nightmare. 

Professor Sandel wrote: “And, despite its inspiring promise of success based on merit, it has a dark side. Building a politics around the idea that a college degree is a precondition for dignified work and social esteem has a corrosive effect on democratic life.”

“It devalues the contributions of those without a diploma, fuels prejudice against the less-educated members of society, effectively excludes most working people from elective government and provokes political backlash.”

Yet, every single day we worship at the altar of merit centred essentially on grade. Our billion-dollar tuition industry is a clear indictment of the obsession that has no name, only a combined number on perforated paper our employers are equally obsessed with, especially our monolith civil service. That seems to determine where you will end up in society, what you will do eventually, how people will see you superficially, and why you are politely identified, blindly sorted and quietly shelved.

As one psychologist Thomas R. Guskey observed: “If someone proposed combining measures of height, weight, diet, and exercise into a single number or mark to represent a person’s physical condition, we would consider it laughable...Yet every day, teachers combine aspects of students’ achievement, attitude, responsibility, effort, and behavior into a single grade that’s recorded on a report card and no one questions it.”

The truth is, your degree, regardless of which university you come from, does not define you. We know that, and want so much to believe that. But the issue, according to Professor Sandel is that society still defines you based on it, and now, curiously, even more.

That is the prejudicial one-dimensional ladder we are all made to scale in a fiercely meritocratic and arrogantly aristocratic society we live in. This is how author Todd Rose (of “The End it Average”) puts it: -

“We all feel the weight of the one-dimensional thinking that has become so pervasive in our averagarian culture: a standardised educational system that ceaselessly sorts and ranks us; a workplace that hires us based on these educational rankings, then frequently imposes new rankings at every annual performance review; a society that doles out rewards, esteem, and adoration according to our professional ranking.” 

“When we look up at these artificial, arbitrary, and meaningless rungs that we are expected to climb, we worry that we might not fully ascend them, that we will be denied those opportunities that are only afforded to those who muscle their way up the one-dimensional ladder.”

Let me end with the quiet but tidal-like wisdom of Professor Sandel. 

He said that “history suggests little correlation between the capacity for political judgment and the ability to win admission to elite universities. The notion that “the best and the brightest” are better at governing than their less credentialed fellow citizen is a myth born of meritocratic hubris.”

He calls for renewing of the dignity of work by putting aside all prejudicial preconditions. He also calls for us to reassess the way we define success and question our meritocratic hubris, by asking ourselves: “Is it my doing that I have the talents that society happens to prize - or is it my good luck?”

He adds: “Appreciating the role of luck in life can prompt a certain humility: There, but for an accident of birth, or the grace of God, or the mystery of fate, go I. This spirit of humility is the civic virtue we need now.” 

Indeed, and strangely, attributing it to luck keeps one grounded, because what is perceived as causation, solo effort of one, is often correlation, group effort of many, disguising as luck. 

Attributing luck is therefore not living your life randomly, surrendering to circumstantial whims, but it is living life realistically, standing on the shoulders of many who came before us. 

I guess that is why the late former deputy prime minister Goh Keng Swee once told veteran banker Wee Cho Yaw that it is better to be born lucky than to be smart. There is a lot of Sandelian wisdom about it.

 

Parti Liyani - Shanmugam"s Micawberism.

Our law minister used the word “Micawberism”. It is “a reference to the feckless optimism displayed by Wilkins Micawber, a character in the Charles Dickens novel David Copperfield.”

The context is the controversial Parti Liyana case, which has resulted in further investigation and review of the justice system in the way stolen items are assessed and the manner the custody/evidential chain is processed. Mind you, that case has also led to disciplinary action being taken against the prosecutors and even Karl Liew was hauled up for questioning for his inconsistent statements in court.

With that backdrop in mind, here is our law minister’s reply to NCMP Leong’s call for a Committee of Inquiry for Parti’s case. 

“Let me put it on record, I have no problem recommending such a commission of inquiry. We have nothing to hide. But in law, they will say (this is) Micawberism.” 

There you have it, that’s the word. It is also defined as “irresponsible optimism”. And in derogatory term, it may be used to describe “shit-stirrer”. 

(Although if you read up his character, with flaws, Micawber was a whistleblower exposing wrongdoings and later retired in Australia to become a magistrate. That is another story altogether). 

But, the point of this post is well surmised in Shanmugam’s own inquiry on the call for COI: - 

“...(Do) we have a commission of inquiry on the entire law, the police and enforcement system? Is that even imaginable? So can we please have some clarity on what is it that concerns you?”

This is where I believe Shanmugam went full throttle, or unplugged. He talked about Goh Keng Swee’s warning about the “insidious “old boy” type” (referring to a type of nepotism) whereby no illegalities are committed - that will cause fundamental structures to be “eroded like the supporting beams of a house after termites have attacked.””

He said that deep connections between those appointed to high places is unavoidable. “They may have met through work, in school or during national service.”

That is why our government has to be vigilant. “Singapore‘s smallness presents a more “challenging environment” in managing connections and interactions among those in positions of influence.””

He added: “We will have to be very careful, always remember we are fiduciaries. It is critical that whatever the relationship, the Government maintains high standards of probity, of conduct, so that decisions are made on objective and impartial assessments.”

Lesson? One, it is about the insidious old boys. 

They do exist you know. They are not a figment of our imagination. Their emergence is expected, and as natural as the rot in the head of a fish once exposed to the public air.

But they do not exist in the majority. That is what makes them so insidious. They nestle at the top of the pyramid. They wield disproportionate leverage by virtue of acquiring wealth, power and fame. They control the masses, and most times, the masses are enthralled by them. And anything that gets in their way, anything that needs to be checked, moderated and silenced, they have their means to do it, in the most legitimate way possible, whereby “no illegalities are committed.”

So, like Matrix Revolution, not all of the people invited want to take the red pill, where their reality is stripped away to reveal the shadowy truth of a society we are living in. 

This ain’t no QAnon, but it is the occasional pierced veil that hides the dubious rich and powerful, and their many legal means of achieving questionable ends. It is therefore a choice between the red pill of knowledge or the blue pill of blissful ignorance. 

But the question is, as posed by our law minister, “Do we have a commission of inquiry on the entire law, the police and enforcement system? Is that even imaginable?”

Yes, the CJ has granted leave for a disciplinary committee to investigate on the prosecutorial conduct concerning the video issue, and there will be some new protocols for the police to implement (and some tweaks on the existing protocols) when it comes to how they conduct their investigation. Even Karl Liew was questioned. What’s next then? 

Are we saying that the Singapore government are the “insidious old boy type”? Are we saying that LML held sway over the AGC and the police in the prosecution of Parti Liyani? 

Or, putting it in another way, that at every prosecutorial crossroad, are the directions of the investigation and prosecution determined by the subtle nods and shake of LML’s head that in turns directs the AG’s head and that nudges the rest of the prosecution head and the police head? So, are the heads at the top bobbing to one synchronised beat of the insidious old boy’s tune? 

Well, our law minister has done his rounds and he presented to Parliament that there is no evidence of that, whether directly or indirectly. 

There is therefore no cause or justification for a COI. The system is not the issue in Parti’s case. It is not systemic. It is individuated, and the “goats” of the system are already singled out for further investigation and discipline. The fault thus lies not in the judicial constellation, but in the wandered-off planets in our shining, unblemished system. 

But, on that note, I do not think parti’s case is the lodestar for one to crack open the flaws of our meritocratic system where the social and income divide have created a platform that subtly discriminates, segregates and oppresses many for the benefit of a handful. 

Alas, no system is perfect and the search for utopia is a dangerous, misguided sport as it often leaves a trail of bodies behind in the name of deluded change. And yesterday’s Parliament was not the forum to dive head first into that rabbit hole. 

So, let me end with Shanmugam’s words. “The rot starts at the top. If the top is clean, the system can work well. And we’ve got to make sure of that. If it starts, then very few things can save such a country.”

Well, can’t argue with that. Leadership at the top is what the people at the bottom depends on. But the rot can come in many forms. And the most insidious ones are those where the people are in blissful ignorance.

 

Parti Liyani - Karl Liew charged with false information.

 

Karl Liew, 43, is being charged with giving false information to a public servant. He told ASP Tang that “he had found 119 pieces of clothing belonging to him inside boxes packed by Ms Parti.” 

He is also accused of “intentionally giving false evidence in a judicial proceeding before District Judge Olivia Low on July 17, 2018.”

The report states: “Accompanied by his legal team and an unidentified woman, (Karl) left the State Courts building at around 11am and entered a black BMW car.” He is represented by lawyer Adam Maniam from Drew & Napier, one of the top law firms in the country. 

Well, I started with that because with that you see a glaring contrast between someone rich in our society facing criminal charges and a maid being hauled to court and being represented pro bono with support from a voluntary migrant organisation, while living in a rented premise, and walking to court everytime she and her lawyer Anil are called to defend the charges against her. Let me flesh it out here for you. 

Assoc Editor Chua Mui Hoong has this morning written a searching article about “Justice in an imperfect world”. Let me just say that while some are leaf blower and some whistle blower, Chua is a button pusher. And one of the hot buttons she had pushed in the Parti’s case is to ask: “But was there bias? Were the police and prosecution officers more inclined to believe the Liews than the maid?”

Our Law Minister talked about the insidious old boy type “that will cause fundamental structures to be “eroded like the supporting beams of a house after termites have attacked.”” Yet, the question here is: “Are these old boy type and the generation that follows after them insidiously, if not unwittingly, creating a society that is more unequal than our Government can ever check and contain, or even have the political will and resolve to check and contain?”

Now, Shanmugam did say this yesterday in Parliament: “the message is, it doesn’t matter who you are. If you do wrong, action will be taken. But it is not only corruption that we must guard against. We must also guard against soft corruption and influence peddling.”

Well, influence peddling also comes in the hard and soft types. The hard type involves string pulling, maybe some disguised donations to a wing of a faculty in return for preferential treatment for one’s kid. But the soft type is equally insidious, because it is like the termites that Shanmugan talked about that erode the supporting beams of society. 

This is where Chua’s probing struck a cognitive dissonance chord with this question:- 

“When Singapore ask if the justice system is biased, they are asking not just whether the privileged get favourable treatment or pull strings for themselves, but also whether police officers, prosecutors, even judges, internalise social hierarchies and make decisions that favour the rich and powerful.”

“Are they more inclined to believe the testimony of someone from a similar socio-economic class as themselves? Who went to the same schools as them?”

Mind you, that soft type of influence peddling is best described as “implicit bias” and we accord that quite unthinkingly onto the rich and famous even when we profess to believe otherwise. 

Most times, it takes conscious intervention to stop and check us from bestowing what is a soft type of favourable biased leaning on people who are wealthy, knowledgeable and/or adored by thousands. 

This is something Shanmugam had spoke about and understood, but did not go far enough to fully address. He said: “People are fed up with unfair structures. Equal opportunities are drying up.” He added that we must give everyone a “fair shake” and “must be alert, guard against the wealthy and the powerful taking unfair advantages.”

“If Liew Mum Leong did unfairly influence the proceedings, then it will be a hit to our foundations. It will hit our sense of fairness, equality and justice. A dent to project Singapore itself because Singapore is built on these ideals.” 

At this juncture, he then said in Parliament that the decision to sack Parti was not sudden. LML had in fact wanted to sack her way before the theft incident. 

But the reality is that he didn’t sack her. Yet, what is however sudden is when Parti was asked to pack immediately and thereafter sent home by flight. That suddenness is from the perspective of Parti, not so much LML’s. 

While I know it is important to present LML’s side, but in my view, it doesn’t change the suddenness of the decision to sack Parti from her side of things. Thus, what may not be sudden to LML doesn’t change what Parti had perceived to be sudden for her, especially when she was given so little time to pack. 

Shanmugam also talked about the threat to complain to MOM about the deployment to Karl’s house. But as it turned out, what Parti had at first wanted to complain to MOM was that she was given short notice to leave, not the deployment. 

Yet, again, the pertinent question is, “what would be in the mind of the LML and Karl at that time?” Even if Parti had told them she wanted to lodge a complaint about the short notice, it is not implausible for LML and Karl to consider the consequences arising from that complaint. And the consequence is that MOM will also find out about the deployment to Karl’s house, that breach of the rule. 

As such, it doesn’t discount what Justice Chan had said about them taking a preemptive step to sack her because she is a perceived liability, or loose canon to them. And what makes it even more intriguing is the recent charges against Karl of giving false information, which further stains his motive from the get-go.

So, let me end with this: while our law minister had addressed the soft corruption and influence peddling, what is more nuanced, but no less insidious, is the concealed working of implicit bias, and how the poor and less educated are constantly singled out and discriminated against, even sidelined and dismissed. 

That I believe is the frog-in-the-gradually-boiling-pot situation, and the consequences are like termites ingesting our foundation and our sense of fairness, equality and justice, the ideals we have built up and held dear.

 

Parti Liyani Saga Part IX.

Well, Sylvia Lim’s motion on Parti Liyani’s case will not be discussed in Parliament next week. She “lost” fair and square by way of ballot. “When more than one MP have submitted an adjournment motion, the MP who gets to speak at a sitting is decided by ballot.” (Lim Min Zhang, ST). 

Between Louis Ng (whose topic for discussion is about second-hand cigarette smoking during covid) and Sylvia’s inequality issue, Ng won the ballot. 

But, not to worry, the PAP MPs will be taking on that issue. It seems like Murali Pillai (Bukit Batok), Vikram Nair (Sembawang GRC) and Tan Wu Meng (Jurong GRC) will be tabling it for discussion, with our Law Minister helming it in a ministerial statement on Monday. 

Somehow, this reminded me of the time when PM Lee wrote a memo to all his ministers, calling it the “Rules of Prudence” just after the PAP won a resounding mandate in the 2015 election. 

He called upon the ministers to be “servants of the people, not masters." He cautioned that MPs should not "mistake the strong mandate election result to mean that our efforts have succeeded, and that we can afford to slacken."

Further, PM Lee also expected them to attend all Parliament sittings unless they have have a valid reason. He said, "Overtime, the public will see that PAP backbenchers are as effective as opposition MPs, if not better, at holding ministers to account, getting issues fully debated, and influencing policies for the better."

Well, that seems like a good rule of prudence - tempering electoral victory in 2015 with a precautionary note to remember one’s civic duty and responsibility. 

But the inequality issue that many people has to confront everyday, which has come to glaring-light in the Parti vs Liew Mun Leong’s case, is, I believe, something that goes beyond just a week of intense discussion in Parliament. 

We all know that. That is the reality of things. And the enduring issue is this - “How far do we want to go down that rabbit hole to address the root cause of an unequal society, with gap widening even more with the new constricted world that is emerging in the shadow of the covid-19 pandemic?”

Where does this rabbit hole then lead us? 

Mm...in my view, the first motion about addressing inequality ought to be about the disproportionate growth of privileges of the status quo. Underscore “disproportionate”. 

In any event, this is best explained with a scripture. In Matthew, Jesus says: “To anyone who has, more will be given and he will grow rich: from anyone who has not, even what he has will be taken away.” 

I know there’s a context behind that scripture, but whether prophetic or not, the Matthew effect has become an economic law with pervasive social consequences upon which the poor often has to bear the brunt of it.

And when you throw in our technocratically fashioned, Singapore-styled meritocracy into the Matthew Effect mix, you get a disconcerting cocktail of good parliamentary intentions and well-intended incremental measures to address inequality that risks lagging (or always lagging) behind the widening rich/poor gap. 

Author Malcolm Gladwell makes this incisive observation: “To the degree that Matthew effects amplify prior advantages and disadvantages, both the fortunes of the fortunate and the misfortunes of the unfortunate are unearned and undeserved”. I guess that is why Goh Keng Swee once told banker Wee Cho Yaw that he prefers to be born lucky than rich. 

But, unearned or undeserved, nothing is stopping the rich from getting richer, with the poor getting poorer, almost by some social law of default, thanks to the ever-widening gap of inequality. 

And this brings me to the point of my post: At a time like this, when everyone below a certain economic livelihood threshold is struggling, what signal are we sending to them when the people we have voted in are enjoying such huge salaries to the extent that they are able to pile it all up for themselves and their future generation?

I know this is a touchy subject, and I am not against reasonable pay. Yet, I believe that it has to be pegged more to the conscience of society, and less to the impulse of the market. Finding the right adaptive balance is the darnest task I know. 

And I am also not blind to the different standards of living of different people. I recently read about an employee in the airline business who had suffered a 20% cut of his more than $20k monthly salary. That, to him, was quite disruptive as he has to sell his properties, dine out less, and go for some personal belt tightening measures. 

But we must never forget that, for a cleaner, who has to pay for her children’s education and living expenses, that same 20% cut can turn her world upside down. 

So, going back to the question, and when it comes to inequality, it is seriously not so much about whether we pay our ministers enough. I always believe that talent comes with a price. A fair society therefore requires that one’s pay justifies one’s talent or contribution. 

But, tbh, when a minister’s sacrifices do not differ that much from the sacrifices of a social worker, a nurse or even a cleaner, I would no doubt still expect the former (minister) to be paid more than the latter because of their coveted talent. 

Yet, at some point, especially during a crisis, where the majority is struggling to make ends meet, the “servants of the people, not masters” that PM Lee is talking about has to be such that one starts to review the justification of one’s pay that is pegged to the market, instead of pegging it to the heart/conscience of public service right? 

The more philosophical question to this is, when is enough enough? And mind you, this applies not just to prosperity gospel preacher, but to politicians as well. 

Let me end with a famous speech by LKY in Parliament in 1996, when he said that he felt very guilty of robbing his friend, Eddie Barker of $30 million had he stayed in Lee and Lee. ”Had he gone into business with my brother, he would have had easily $60 million”.

But, what is surprising is that Barker himself was bewildered by the high salary of ministers at $60k monthly, which was more than double the current salary at that time. 

And at a social gathering at his home, with a group of Oxbridge graduates, Barker shared that “he did not understand the need for huge salaries.” He even told his good friend, Subhas Anandan, that as long as he got his “cigarettes and beer”, he would be fine (page 207, “EW Barker - The People’s Minister”). 

I guess when you peg your worth to the market, and as you pile up your net worth with ever-higher standards of living, enough is seldom enough. But when you peg it to society’s conscience and to the heart of public service, you will experience what Barker had experienced in his decades of giving selflessly to the people wherever he is placed. And you will then be able to be inspired and contented with these words by the same man. 

“Life is what you make of it. There are some who inherit wealth only to squander it away, while others make their fortune on their own efforts by dint of hard work, determination and perseverance.”

“But happiness is not necessarily associated with wealth. The important thing is to have a purpose in life, a goal to achieve and the satisfaction of achieving it.”

That about sums up a life worth living for. A life defined by purpose, perseverance and contentment.