The price of Quality and the value of Singaporean
PC Show scores $51.7m in sales, hmm that is a huge figure for just 4 days of exhibition at Suntec, I went to the PC Show last sunday just to see what there for display and bought some stuffs. Saw quite a number of good deals and the staggering crowd.
Recently, there was a report on “Singapore is top Asian city with highest quality of living”. Firstly, to be the Asian city of highest quality of living shows the effort and policies that transform Singapore from a third world to a first world country and we have to thank our MM Lee and his generation on that. At the same time, MM Lee mentioned having a dynamic economy but that is just one part of the equation. Try dissecting how quality is made up, and gives
- Political and social environment (political stability, crime, law enforcement, etc)
- Economic environment (currency exchange regulations, banking services, etc)
- Socio-cultural environment (censorship, limitations on personal freedom, etc)
- Health and sanitation (medical supplies and services, infectious diseases, sewage, waste disposal, air pollution, etc)
- Schools and education (standard and availability of international schools, etc)
- Public services and transportation (electricity, water, public transport, traffic congestion, etc)
- Recreation (restaurants, theatres, cinemas, sports and leisure, etc)
- Consumer goods (availability of food/daily consumption items, cars, etc)
- Housing (housing, household appliances, furniture, maintenance services, etc)
- Natural environment (climate, record of natural disasters)
Look closely at the common denomination, that’s right, it is the cost of everything, from currency to public housing and health. Seems that the tiny island have finally overtook Japan. The price of quality is cost and the cost of living is highest in Asia.
Before I proceed further, let me guide you to a little known index, called the Gini Index. It is basically a graph showing the disparity between the rich and poor. Zero means perfect equality (everyone has the same income) and 100 means perfect inequality and distribution for income in fact have become worse from 38.3% in 1983 to around 48% in 2007 taken from IMF. Therefore relatively speaking, the poor are now poorer than 20 years ago vice versa, and quality of living by Mercer becomes a facade, nothing more.
While the tiny country still continue to have a high standard of living shown in the Human Development Index, a comparative measure of life expectancy, literacy, education, and standards of living for countries worldwide. This is a more accurate representation of the country development, and standard of living rather than the “cost” of living.
Finally, there are some things money can’t buy, for everything else there is a price to pay for the value of quality. That was suppose to be the original title on the price of everything and its value of quality. 