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Retirement Adequacy, Healthcare And Cost Of Living Are Top Concerns For Singaporeans

Retirement adequacy, healthcare and cost of living are top concerns of Singaporeans, a pre-Budget 2015 feedback exercise by REACH showed. These topics accounted for about a third of feedback gathered the Government feedback portal said in a news release on Monday (Feb 16).

The exercise, jointly organised by REACH and the Ministry of Finance, collected feedback from online platforms, email, booths known as Listening Points, and a pre-Budget dialogue between late November last year and end-January.

RETIREMENT ADEQUACY

The exercise showed that Singaporeans are concerned about having enough funds after retirement to cope with daily expenses and rising cost of living – particularly for those who have not fully paid up their housing loans.

There was “anticipation” among some Singaporeans that the Silver Support Scheme would help them, REACH said. “Nevertheless, there were also views that individuals need to take responsibility by not overextending themselves when buying their homes, and preparing for their retirement,” REACH added.

Notably, the feedback had been collected before the recommendations of a Central Provident Fund (CPF) Advisory Panel were announced earlier this month, and respondents in the feedback exercise had asked for greater withdrawal flexibility from their CPF accounts upon retirement, which the panel had recommended.

Some were worried that the CPF Minimum Sum “might be increasingly be out of reach for lower-income and vulnerable Singaporeans”, REACH said.

Regarding the CPF Minimum Sum Topping-Up Scheme, some contributors suggested the Government match top-ups dollar-for-dollar to encourage more to contribute to the retirement accounts of their family members. However, some said this might only benefit the well-to-do who are cash-rich.

HEALTHCARE

Several were concerned that medical and hospitalisation costs may become increasingly unmanageable “especially for patients with chronic and life-threatening conditions”, REACH found. This is despite the introduction of the MediShield Life scheme which will be implemented in end-2015.

Many contributors said the Government should look into shortening waiting time for treatment at hospitals, increasing manpower and providing more hospital beds to meet rising healthcare demands.

They also recommended providing healthcare workers with more training on customer relations, and having translators in hospitals to overcome language barriers.

COST OF LIVING

The exercise saw many Singaporeans calling for more financial assistance to subsidise “everyday goods and services”. Some felt the Government should distribute cash handouts, grocery vouchers, and regulate the prices of goods to keep them affordable.

Many felt that their salaries had not kept pace with rising inflation, and there were comments that the Government should not just focus on helping the lower-income as the middle-income were also feeling the pinch, REACH said.

“Singaporeans continue to worry about rising cost of living which the Government seeks to address through various measures,” said REACH chairman and Senior Minister of State for Health, Dr Amy Khor. “But a key way to help Singaporeans cope with the cost of living must be to enable and equip them with the relevant skills so that they can have better jobs and better pay.”

Source: www.channelnewsasia.com

February 17, 2015
Economists Expect Budget Surplus For FY2014

Measures to help older Singaporeans, such as the S$8 billion Pioneer Generation package, were a big part of Budget 2014.

Factoring that in, along with other measures and the Net Investment Returns Contribution, the Government had projected an overall budget deficit of around $1.2 billion or about 0.3 per cent of the GDP.

However, economists estimate that FY2014 could turn in a budget surplus. United Overseas Bank is forecasting an overall budget surplus of S$390 million. DBS Bank is projecting a surplus at S$1.9 billion, and OCBC Bank at around S$1.3 billion.

“In terms of the fiscal picture, it still looks fairly healthy as far as operating revenue is concerned, because the first nine months of FY2014, we are still running at close to 8 per cent above trend,” said Ms Selena Ling, head of Treasury Research and Strategy at OCBC.

“And that’s thanks really to income taxes being stronger than expected, and of course, GST also being flat to modest growth year-on-year. Nevertheless we still expect operating revenue to come in above what was the FY2014 plan.”

UOB economist Francis Tan said: “Due to pretty strong GDP growth in 2013, that contributed to the income from taxation and corporate taxation in FY 2014. We are thinking that the corporate and income tax – which is the largest still, in terms of share of Government’s total revenue – we are thinking that it actually grew around 4.2 per cent year-on-year. In fact, it could be coming in better than what we saw in 2013, which was a 3.6 per cent gain during that time.”

Economists said the fairly resilient income and corporate earnings growth will support tax revenue collections. And it is expected to offset the drop in revenue from stamp duties. UOB projects that the revenue from stamp duties for FY2014 could fall 33 per cent year-on-year to about S$2.9 billion. That is largely due to the weaker property market which has been affected by a slew of cooling measures and loan curbs.

UOB added that tax revenue from motor vehicles could contract marginally (0.5%) as the decline in motor vehicle sales stabilised. Meanwhile, it estimated that betting taxes collected in 2014 may trend higher at 4.6 per cent, possibly due to the increase in betting duty rates on lotteries from July 2014.

For FY 2015, economists are expecting the government to continue to commit substantial amount of funds for social programmes. They include initiatives like the Skills Future Jubilee Fund to help Singaporeans build skills for the future, as well as the Silver Support Programme to assist needy seniors.

“I think what we will see in this Silver Support scheme is that it will come in similar form as the Pioneer Generation Package which we saw last year. I expect the Government to set aside a sum of about S$10 billion to S$12 billion, where by it will put the sum in this fund for investment, and returns from investments will be used to find this Silver Support Scheme,” said DBS Bank’s senior economist Irvin Seah.

UOB is forecasting a special transfer of S$11 billion for FY2015, while OCBC puts it at around S$12 billion.

DBS is projecting an overall budget deficit of S$1.3 billion for FY2015, but OCBC expects to see a surplus of S$200 million, and UOB a surplus of S$710 million.

Source: www.channelnewsasia.com

February 17, 2015
Indonesia Transfers 7 Foreign Convicted Drug Smugglers To Prison Island To Be Executed

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Eight convicted drug smugglers, including seven foreigners, will be transferred to an Indonesian prison island this week for imminent execution despite international appeals for clemency, an official said Monday.

Among the eight are Andrew Chan, 31, and Myuran Sukumaran, 33, the ringleaders of a group of nine Australians arrested in 2005 for attempting to smuggle 8.3 kilograms (18.3 pounds) of heroin to Australia from the Indonesian resort island of Bali. The seven other members of the group — dubbed the “Bali Nine” by Australian media — have received prison sentences ranging from 20 years to life.

In addition to Chan and Sukumaran, five men from France, Brazil, Ghana, Nigeria and Indonesia, and a woman from the Philippines, will face a firing squad after being moved to Nusa Kambangan prison, Attorney General’s Office spokesman Tony Spontana said, without giving exact dates. Six other drug smugglers, including five foreigners, were executed in January at the same prison, located off Indonesia’s main island of Java.

Indonesian President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo has rejected appeals by Australia’s government for clemency for Chan and Sukumaran, and vowed not to grant mercy to any other drug offenders because Indonesia is suffering a “drug emergency.”

Australia has abolished capital punishment and opposes executions of any Australian overseas.

Lawyers for the two Australians, who are currently being held at a Bali prison, filed a complaint in an administrative court last week to challenge Jokowi’s rejection of the appeals, arguing that it was made without consideration of their remorse and rehabilitation. A hearing on the complaint is scheduled for next week.

Spontana, however, said the executions would not be delayed. “Their legal options were exhausted after their clemency was rejected by the president,” he said. “The next step is execution.”

In Australia earlier Monday, Prime Minister Tony Abbott said he had personally appealed to Jokowi to stop the executions.

“Like millions of Australians, I feel sick in the pit of my stomach when I think about what is quite possibly happening to these youngsters,” he told reporters.

Abbott said his government has been trying to appeal to Indonesia’s sense of itself as a stable democracy under the rule of law.

“What I don’t want to do is turn this into some kind of test of strength,” he said. “I think we are much more likely to back the Indonesians into a corner than to get the result we want.”

Six former Australian prime ministers on Monday added their voices to calls to spare the Australians.

Former prime ministers Malcolm Fraser, Bob Hawke, Paul Keating, John Howard, Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard issued statements in support of the pair published in The Australian national newspaper on Tuesday.

“As a deep, long-standing friend of Indonesia, I would respectfully request an act of clemency,” wrote Rudd, who was prime minister from 2007 until 2010, then again in 2013.

“Mercy being shown in such circumstances would not weaken the deterrent effect of Indonesia’s strong anti-drug laws,” wrote Howard, who was prime minister from 1996 until 2007.

Indonesian Foreign Ministry officials met with embassy representatives from the foreign death row inmates’ countries Monday to discuss the executions. The representatives and the Indonesian officials declined to talk to the media after the meeting.

United Nations human rights experts have expressed concern at reports indicating trials for some of the defendants did not meet international standards of fairness and have called for an immediate halt to further executions in Indonesia.

Indonesia has extremely strict drug laws. On Jan. 18, it executed six drug convicts by firing squad, including foreigners from Brazil, Malawi, Nigeria, the Netherlands and Vietnam, brushing aside last-minute appeals by foreign leaders.

There are 133 people on death row in Indonesia, including 57 for drug crimes and two convicted terrorists.

Source: https://sg.news.yahoo.com

February 17, 2015
Household Incomes In Singapore Rise But Income Gap Remains Largely Unchanged

The earnings of households across income levels grew last year, even after accounting for inflation, while the income gap between the rich and the poor remained largely unchanged from 2013.

Numbers released yesterday by the Department of Statistics (SingStat) on key household income trends last year showed that the median monthly household income from work grew to S$8,290, up 4.1 per cent after accounting for inflation. This was the highest real increase since 2011, which saw a 5.6 per cent growth from 2010.

Factoring in the household sizes, the median monthly household income from work per household member also rose by 4.7 per cent last year, after accounting for inflation.

Meanwhile, the Gini coefficient — a measure of income inequality — was 0.464 last year, compared with 0.463 in 2013. After adjusting for Government transfers, it was 0.412 last year, slightly higher than 0.409 in 2013.

SingStat said this was because the amount of Government transfers and taxes was lower last year compared with 2013, when there were more one-off payments such as one-off Medisave top-ups and special payments on top of the permanent GST voucher payments. “In the past two years, the Gini, after accounting for Government transfers and taxes, had been at its lowest level in a decade,” added SingStat.

Experts whom TODAY spoke to attributed the growth in real household income to a tighter labour market, where there could have been wage increments, given the need to retain labour.

While the experts felt the Government would be able to continue with the transfers and taxes for the lower income, given that it had been careful with such payments so far, they said it would need to look at increasing productivity levels and upgrading employers’ skills in the longer term.

OCBC economist Selena Ling felt it was encouraging to see the Gini coefficient stabilising at a relatively lower level, but said the Government would need to continue to balance the short-term wants of people with the longer-term issue of fiscal sustainability. Nonetheless, she noted that the Government had been “fairly prudent”. “Even last year’s budget, the fact that it can fund, completely upfront, S$8 billion (for the) Pioneer Generation Package tells you something about the health of the fiscal position for Singapore,” she said.

CIMB economist Song Seng Wun felt that raising household income through Government transfers was “not a sustainable model”, and said the focus would continue to be on the drive to increase productivity. “What we want to do is to (look) at income as a whole, how it can be lifted through a more broad-based rise in wages,” he added.

On the other hand, pointing to the cumulative growth in average income per household member over the past five years, UOB economist Alvin Liew noted that the lowest-income group at the 1st to 10th percentile saw a lower income growth of 17.2 per cent, compared with those at the 11th to 40th percentile.

Noting that there could be “something chronic” within that group preventing them from being able to raise their incomes at a faster pace, Mr Liew said this group needed more help.

He added that those in the middle-income groups also saw lower income growth of less than 5 per cent last year. The 41st to 50th percentile recorded a 4.8 per cent growth in income, while the 51st to 80th percentile saw an income growth of 4.6 per cent.

While this could be too broad a group to be classified as a sandwiched class, Mr Liew said these were the people who do not qualify for Government transfers and taxes, though their income levels are not growing as fast.

“The question is, how do you help these people who are probably not getting the transfers, but their incomes are not growing as fast … while you have other things that are moving against them, like elevated property prices and the growing cost of living in Singapore,” he added.

Source: www.todayonline.com

February 17, 2015
Westerners Join Iraqi Christian Militia To Fight Against IS

DUHOK, Iraq (Reuters) – Saint Michael, the archangel of battle, is tattooed across the back of a U.S. army veteran who recently returned to Iraq and joined a Christian militia fighting Islamic State in what he sees as a biblical war between good and evil.

Brett, 28, carries the same thumb-worn pocket Bible he did whilst deployed to Iraq in 2006 – a picture of the Virgin Mary tucked inside its pages and his favourite verses highlighted.

“It’s very different,” he said, asked how the experiences compared. “Here I’m fighting for a people and for a faith, and the enemy is much bigger and more brutal.”

Thousands of foreigners have flocked to Iraq and Syria in the past two years, mostly to join Islamic State, but a handful of idealistic Westerners are enlisting as well, citing frustration their governments are not doing more to combat the ultra-radical Islamists or prevent the suffering of innocents.

The militia they joined is called Dwekh Nawsha – meaning self-sacrifice in the ancient Aramaic language spoken by Christ and still used by Assyrian Christians, who consider themselves the indigenous people of Iraq.

A map on the wall in the office of the Assyrian political party affiliated with Dwekh Nawsha marks the Christian towns in northern Iraq, fanning out around the city of Mosul.

The majority are now under control of Islamic State, which overran Mosul last summer and issued am ultimatum to Christians: pay a tax, convert to Islam, or die by the sword. Most fled.

Dwekh Nawsha operates alongside Kurdish peshmerga forces to protect Christian villages on the frontline in Nineveh province.

“These are some of the only towns in Nineveh where church bells ring. In every other town the bells have gone silent, and that’s unacceptable,” said Brett, who has “The King of Nineveh” written in Arabic on the front of his army vest.

Brett, who like other foreign volunteers withheld his last name out of concern for his family’s safety, is the only one to have engaged in fighting so far.

The others, who arrived just last week, were turned back from the frontline on Friday by Kurdish security services who said they needed official authorisation.

“STOP SOME ATROCITIES”

Tim shut down his construction business in Britain last year, sold his house and bought two plane tickets to Iraq: one for himself and another for a 44-year-old American software engineer he met through the internet.

The men joined up at Dubai airport, flew to the Kurdish city of Suleimaniyah and took a taxi to Duhok, where they arrived last week.

“I’m here to make a difference and hopefully put a stop to some atrocities,” said 38-year-old Tim, who previously worked in the prison service. “I’m just an average guy from England really.”

Scott, the software engineer, served in the U.S. Army in the 1990s, but lately spent most of his time in front of a computer screen in North Carolina.

He was mesmerised by images of Islamic State militants hounding Iraq’s Yazidi minority and became fixated on the struggle for the Syrian border town of Kobani — the target of a relentless campaign by the jihadists, who were held off by the lightly armed Kurdish YPG militia, backed by U.S. air strikes.

Scott had planned to join the YPG, which has drawn a flurry of foreign recruits, but changed his mind four days before heading to the Middle East after growing suspicious of the group’s ties to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

He and the other volunteers worried they would not be allowed home if they were associated with the PKK, which the United States and Europe consider a terrorist organisation. They also said they disliked the group’s leftist ideology.

The only foreign woman in Dwekh Nawsha’s ranks said she had been inspired by the role of women in the YPG, but identified more closely with the “traditional” values of the Christian militia.

Wearing a baseball cap over her balaclava, she said radical Islam was at the root of many conflicts and had to be contained.

All the volunteers said they were prepared to stay in Iraq indefinitely.

“Everyone dies,” said Brett, asked about the prospect of being killed. “One of my favourite verses in the Bible says: be faithful unto death, and I shall give you the crown of life.”

Source: https://sg.news.yahoo.com

February 16, 2015