The following article looks very familiar to Australians except for the sovereign wealth funds which Singapore has and Australia does not. The price of property is so high in Singapore every time a new skyscraper is sold it causes a boost in GDP.

However the wealth, apart from inflated property prices does not trickle down.

Surveys have shown that >50% of Singaporeans would leave if given opportunity.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jessecolombo/2014/01/13/why-singapores-economy-is-heading-for-an-iceland-style-meltdown/5/


Quote:

In 2007, Iceland was celebrated for attaining the world’s highest standard of living according to the U.N.’s annual Human Development Index report. In less than a generation, the tiny North Atlantic island had transformed from a traditional fishing and tourism-based economic backwater into a finance and banking powerhouse, rocketing the country’s wealth and living standards to enviable new heights. Sadly, Iceland’s economic boom was an illusion based on a reckless credit and asset bubble that led to a terrifying financial crisis when it popped in 2008. Singapore’s property bubble has inflated the average price of a new 1,000-square-foot condo to approximately $1 million to $1.2 million Singapore dollars ($799,000 to $965,638 U.S.), effectively pricing out many middle class and younger workers, while transferring wealth – at least until the bubble pops – to older and wealthier Singaporeans. A 2013 study by The Economist magazine showed that Singapore has the world’s third most expensive residential property market on a price-to-rent basis, making it 57 percent overvalued versus its long-term average, behind only Canada and Hong Kong (which I consider to have property bubbles of their own). Singapore’s rental yields are miniscule at under 4 percent, and the country’s 25.38 average house price-to-income ratio confirms the overvaluation reading given by the price-to-rent ratio. In contrast, the U.S.’ average house price-to-income ratio is 2.16, while Germany’s ratio is 4.78, the U.K.’s ratio is 6.73, and Japan’s ratio is 6.99. Singapore’s rapidly rising housing costs have resulted in an inflation problem in recent years, which is unsurprising considering how much the country’s money supply has risen. An increasing money supply leads to the dilution of a currency’s value, which manifests itself in the form of inflation or higher living costs. As a result, Singapore now ranks as one of the world’s ten most expensive cities. The fuel for Singapore’s property bubble is provided by a growing mortgage bubble, which has greatly contributed to the rapid rise in household debt that was discussed earlier. Singapore’s mortgage rates – which are based on the SIBOR interest rate – are at all time lows, which is encouraging the country’s mortgage borrowing binge. Mortgage loan growth rose by 18 percent each year over the last three years, bringing total outstanding mortgages to 46 percent of Singapore’s gross domestic product (GDP) from 35 percent. Nearly a third of Singapore’s mortgages are utilized for speculative property purchases rather than owner occupation, which is an indication of the level of speculative fervor in the country’s property market. Singapore’s government has enacted various cooling measures to slow the residential property bubble’s growth, such as requiring foreign buyers to pay a 10 percent Additional Buyer’s Stamp Duty, capping loan tenures at 35 years, and mandating more conservative loan-to-value (LTV) limits. While these cooling measures have slowed the property bubble’s growth to an extent, they do not address the bubble’s root cause: abnormally low interest rates. Furthermore, these measures do not change the fact that Singapore’s property bubble has already been inflated to economy threatening levels, nor do they help to deflate the existing bubble. The damage (to be realized in the future) has already been done and is “baked into the cake”; Singapore’s property bubble cooling measures are tantamount to putting a Band-Aid on a flesh wound. Singapore’s banks are also exposed to the ultimate popping of the country’s property bubble because they hold almost half of their credit portfolios in local property-related loans, with residential mortgages accounting for nearly a third of their overall loan portfolios – a record high. Approximately 70 percent of Singapore’s mortgages have floating interest rates and almost a third of Singapore’s mortgages are used for speculative property purchases. After three years of 18 percent annual mortgage loan growth, total outstanding mortgages rose from 35 percent of Singapore’s gross domestic product (GDP) to 46 percent, which poses a significant threat to the country’s banking system. To make matters worse, bank loans for building and construction combined with total outstanding mortgages surged from 62 percent to 79 percent of Singapore’s GDP in the past three years. Like U.S. and Icelandic banks during their countries’ housing bubbles of 2003 to 2007, Singapore’s banks are experiencing good times as the bubble inflates, but are heading for a crisis when interest rates eventually rise. Singapore’s government is limited in its ability to bail out its financial institutions due to its significant public debt, which is one of the world’s highest at over 110 percent of the city-state’s GDP – a figure that is worse than the U.S.’ 106 percent public debt to GDP ratio.

Singapora destined to be the poor yellow trash of Asia?

Grappler Deep State Feller wrote on Mar 24^th, 2015 at 1:53pm:

Singapora destined to be the poor yellow trash of Asia?

Unless Abbott induces in Australia mass population-wide cases of jaundice to escape white trash label.

Grappler Deep State Feller wrote on Mar 24^th, 2015 at 1:53pm:

Singapora destined to be the poor yellow trash of Asia?

STOP THE BOATS.

Singapore is totalitarian fascist State. Citizens are just collateral. They cannot even own property. If Australia is not clinical and fascist enough for you then you should go to Singapore.

A mega crash would be great for the people of Singapore.

gone wrote on Mar 24^th, 2015 at 3:14pm:

Singapore is totalitarian fascist State. Citizens are just collateral. They cannot even own property. If Australia is not clinical and fascist enough for you then you should go to Singapore. A mega crash would be great for the people of Singapore.

Its the brave new world where the proletariat are indoctrinated from day of birth to produce an obedient and subservient people. They are imbued with the right to obey.

Wikipedia- There is a ban on importing chewing gum into Singapore which is strictly enforced. Since 2004, only chewing gum of therapeutic value is allowed into Singapore under the "Regulation of Imports and Exports (Chewing Gum) Regulations." Gum can be bought from a doctor, but must be prescribed.

According to the Regulations, "importing" means to "bring or cause to be brought into Singapore by land, water or air from any place which is outside Singapore ..." any goods, even if they are not for purposes of trade.[1][original research?]

Under the rule, no gum is allowed to be bought or sold inside Singapore and there is a $500 fine for spitting out gum on the streets.....

Imagine living in a fascist dunghole like Singapore!!!

Happy Lucky wrote on Mar 24^th, 2015 at 3:43pm:

Imagine living in a fascist dunghole like Singapore!!!

fantastic, never had any problems the whole time I was there. Safe and clean with no drunken yobbos. Paradise.

Down on the Border Little River Band (excerpt)

And I never will go
To Singapore
The people there
Will cut your hair
In Singapore

On their streets
There's a life of plenty
But they'll never know
About the freedom show
They're livin'
In darkness years ago
Down on the border

They built a wall at the border
Not to keep us out
But to leave no doubt
They're out of order, hey

And all the people
Who are trapped within
Serve to show
Just how far we'll go
And how dumb we've been

Heres the survey that published that 56% want to emigrate. Most are trapped on the treadmill.

The Singapore masters have used the free trade concept to allow the import of low wage slave labor which suppresses the wage demands of Singaporeans. If this is a democracy how can they allow companies to pay imported workers less than they pay Siingaporeans?

Singapore is very contrived and controlled to the benefit of the masters, the Lee Kuan Yew family and their stooges.

http://news.asiaone.com/News/Latest+News/Singapore/Story/A1Story20121007-376116.html


Quote:

A Mindshare survey carried out early this year found that 56 per cent of the 2,000-odd polled agreed or strongly agreed that, "given a choice, I would like to migrate". Migration specialist Brenda Yeoh, dean of the National University of Singapore's Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, is not surprised and is hardly alarmed. "The percentage would be much higher than the reality of emigration (because) then, there is the reality check (of) resources and emotional ties to family. So it shouldn't send the nation into a massive panic about 50 per cent of our population disappearing," she says. Even so, there is a world of difference between actively wanting to be in Singapore, and simply being here because you can't be anywhere else. If more than half of Singaporeans harbour some suspicion (no matter how idle or misinformed) that life elsewhere might be more relaxed, more enjoyable, more vibrant - just more - it does not bode well. It does not help that for some, the vice of paucity continues to tighten in Singapore, heightening the contrast with the perceived abundance in other countries. The Mindshare survey, for instance, showcases a large wedge of Singaporeans who increasingly feel themselves painted into a corner. In Singapore's Consumer Price Index last year, the cost of housing rose 8.3 per cent year on year, a rate of increase bested only by that of the cost of transport - another national bugbear - at 11.9 per cent. For the first time in the history of Singapore, a whole generation of wage earners face the chilling possibility that their lives are going to be worse than their parents'. But 49 per cent of the respondents in the Mindshare survey agree or strongly agree that the Government is doing a good job running the country. And the "vocal minority" theory is borne out, with only 8 per cent disagreeing or strongly disagreeing. What bears further scrutiny, however, is the figure of 43 per cent who are ambivalent on the matter. So, where does one go from here, literally? Will there be an exodus to the 5pm quitting times of Australia? In June, there were 200,000 Singaporeans living abroad for at least six cumulative months in the previous 12 months, a 27 per cent increase from nine years ago, says the National Population and Talent Division. The World Bank has higher figures, with almost 300,000 Singaporeans considered migrants in 2010. "The way I teach migration now has changed. I don't teach it as uprooting and settling (but) as a fluid to-ing and fro-ing," says Prof Yeoh. It is a comforting thought that more people are not necessarily leaving for good, but what happens when the people you govern are no longer exclusively yours? Most countries' policies, including Singapore's, have not kept up with this national fluidity. "My view is that we should give more credit to more flexible kinds of identities today. I have evidence to show people are able to cope with multiple identities," she says. It is ironic, then, that in a time of malleable nationalities, the attitude towards foreigners has hardened. And the perception of job scarcity is bemusing, given that Singapore has a lower unemployment rate than the countries Singaporeans are moving to. Why then do people think they would like to be someplace else? Perhaps the National Conversation will clarify matters. It will not be easy - for as we ponder the nation's navel, we have to look past the fluff.

Svengali wrote on Mar 24^th, 2015 at 6:39pm:

Heres the survey that published that 56% want to emigrate. Most are trapped on the treadmill. The Singapore masters have used the free trade concept to allow the import of low wage slave labor which suppresses the wage demands of Singaporeans. If this is a democracy how can they allow companies to pay imported workers less than they pay Siingaporeans? Singapore is very contrived and controlled to the benefit of the masters, the Lee Kuan Yew family and their stooges.

I'll repeat my answer to this one here:-

http://www.ozpolitic.com/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1427109399


"It's actually not State Capitalism - it is capitalism engineered to suit the voracity of the warlords running the show, same as China - and backed by the police, military, judiciary, and legislature, and even including a Reign of terror with draconian punishments for minor infringements to keep the peasants in line - nothing new in Asia.

If it were indeed 'state capitalism' there would be significantly more benefit to the ordinary people and less to the fat cats.

THIS - as I've advised you on many occasions - is the position our political classes aspire to for themselves - to run the State for their own benefit. "