i was looking through this article and i tot transport minister is talking some screwed up bullshit. well at least base on my very limited common knowledge.
"SINGAPORE : It would take a further 1.5 percentage point hike in GST if bus and train rides were to be made completely free.
Transport Minister Raymond Lim revealed this at a dialogue session with MacPherson residents on Sunday.
One resident at the session said: "(During) this tough and uncertain period, I hope there will be no increase in transport fares."
With leaner times ahead and recovery not yet in sight, public transport fares — always a hot issue — dominated the discussion.
And while Mr Lim is making no promises, he said he understands ground concerns and pointed out that the Public Transport Council will look carefully at economic conditions before considering any increase.
But if things became really bad, will the government consider subsidising public transport fares?
Mr Lim pointed out that even with subsidies, it will still be the public which ends up paying.
Mr Lim elaborated: "There are only two persons who pay when it comes to public transport fares. One, I use — I pay. Or two, I use — you help me subsidise my ride. What happens when you subsidise my rides? That means the taxpayers are now paying."
Going to the other end of the spectrum, if rides were to be made completely free, that would impose a heavy tax burden on the people, as it takes S$1.2 billion just to run the bus and train systems annually.
Mr Lim said: "The money still must come from somewhere, right? It is about a 1.5 percentage point increase of your GST. So, now it is 7%. You want it to be free, do you want the GST to go up to 8.5% to run a completely free bus and train system?"
But with oil prices — which operators traditionally cite as one of their high cost factors — dropping significantly in recent months, why have bus fares not come down in tandem?
Mr Lim explained: "This is because the public transport fare is not directly linked to the oil prices. We link it to national factors, like the inflation level in Singapore, and the wage level in the whole of Singapore."
Moving to a cheaper form of transport, one resident asked: "I would like to know... whether we are having, in the near future, a pro—bicycle government policy, where it can provide shady bicycle tracks all over the island."
For now, Mr Lim said using two—wheelers as a form of transport is good for just intra—town travel. And it cannot be applied uniformly across the island but has to be adapted for different communities.
Apart from Tampines, authorities are also looking at Yishun and Sembawang for pilot cycling projects.
MacPherson is a constituency which has a high number of compact high—rise HDB flats, and a population that has a higher proportion of the elderly above the age of 50 who are more likely to be from the lower household income group.
It is not surprising then that not just public transport fares but also other cost of living issues that dominated the dialogue session. These included questions on whether costs of goods and services are expected to come down during this recession.
Another topic touched on was that of foreigners working in Singapore. One issue raised was whether the policy of letting foreign workers go first should also apply at the management level.
Mr Lim pointed out that this differs from company to company, and depends on how badly the particular company needed the special skill sets of those management staff. — CNA/ms"
um... WTF!!!! are we asking for free public transport??? is he taking us for retards or wad? omg totally cant believe what the hell he is talking. i dun think he is getting the point the public is trying to make. then he goes on to make the comment "Public Transport Council will look carefully at economic conditions before considering any increase" - which measns. "f*** off. i dun give a shit if u think prices are too high. its not coming down. it'll never will. MAYBE i'll consider not raising it so high next time."
"Mr Lim pointed out that even with subsidies, it will still be the public which ends up paying."........ like duh........ um when does the public not pay for anything? for god's sakes wth are u talking? so what you are trying to say is..... if there are no subsidies, we are not paying?
Mr Lim elaborated: "There are only two persons who pay when it comes to public transport fares. One, I use — I pay. Or two, I use — you help me subsidise my ride. What happens when you subsidise my rides? That means the taxpayers are now paying."......... oh so now u are trying to get urself out of this awkward statement you jus made. like how george bush does it all the time. and sinks deeper into the pile of shit u jus dumped.... how abt: one, i use - i pay. two, i use - you help me subsidise. you use, i help you subsidise. that means everyone pays. hur....
and stop saying how much it costs to make public transport free. we dun want it free... the money must come from somewhere? yes we know. hmmm.... how abt coming from all the money u earn from ERP and COE? nice....
and i frankly think the resident who asked abt the bicycle thing quite retarded. asking for shady bicycle tracks around spore. omg.... might as well go on and ask for spore to be fully air conditioned. then spore and ban smoking all together and increase GST to 20%. how abt that retard.
i feel that the prices for public transport should go down jus like how electricity prices went down after the oil price hike died down. its a way of pacifying the public. sometimes i guess its not too good to test the limit too far.
but with regards to tax and inflation and wages. i'm wondering. why ministers like to use the excuse of inflation and increasing wages to increase tax. spore's tax is pretty much all by percentage. lets say GST. the amount taxed increases along with inflation. so it doesnt reli matter how much inflation is. the amount taxed will increase along with inflation cos the govt is always taxing along with this particular percentage of spending. and looking at things from another point of view. the increase of wage and general prices hardly doubled in the past decade. lets say inflation is 50% over the past decade. the cheapest can of coke i can get is around 40c in 98 its around 55c now. a machicken meal is $4.50 last time and aruond $6.50 now. so 50% is okay. but look at GST, from 3& to 7%. a whopping 233% increase!!! hmmm..... food for thought.
oh well. its common that once prices go up. they'll never come down. govts find excuse to increase prices. then they'll sneakly keep prices up. i'm not referring specifically to spore here. look at china. cost of living in beijing has gone up substantially this year mainly due to the olympic games. the prices are not going down. i'll like to see how the chinese deal with this. on the outside china looks okay from this economic crisis. but i say its jus a outer shell. the damage is deeply felt in china. more serious that anyone of us expect. but china is so good at keeping bad news away from the world and her own citizens (look at SARS, bird flu, and the all the chemical spills and mine collapse shit, nothing leaks out, except all the poisonous chemicals).
gerbert i do not agree with your view that we do not have to worry abt shortage of food. i know abt all the hydoponanics or hrydro-dunno-wad-shit thing farming. but its pretty much limited to vegetables. i'm talking abt proper crops here. maize, corn, potato, rice. in chinse we call 五谷杂粮. have u seen rice, potato or corn grown in multi level indoor farms? i guess not.
i'm not sure if u tried farming before but i did. my grandparents are farmers. so i've tried growing random stuff in the field before. and i fell countless times into the padi field, destroying acres of rice. the technique is still damn freaking ancient. and i doubt it'll change much. rice padi for example. u grow the seeds first in a tight cluster. then u talk the younglings and manually insert them into the wet field. its not something easily done by machines. and there is a limit to how densely the crops can be grown. so there is not much room for improvement. take my word for it. we will see the effects of shortage of food in decades to come.
we are already very easily affected by natural disasters. one hurrican in vietnam causes regional prices of rice to go up. flour and rice prices have been consistantly rising through the years. go ask ur mum they'll know.
i predict that agriculture will be a sunrise industry in the decades to come.
jenhan gets screwed by mum. hope i dun get screwed too badly haha. =x
and i do not eat grass. i never eat before. and i'll never eat in the future.
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