Hacker News Reader

Comment by ekianjo | Hacker News Reader

> There is no progress whatsoever.

Economic progress is a thing. https://www.worldbank.org/en/country/singapore/overview

> Singapore is a high-income economy with a gross national income of US$54,530 per capita, as of 2017. The country provides one of the world’s most business-friendly regulatory environment for local entrepreneurs and is ranked among the world’s most competitive economies.

> In the decades after independence, Singapore rapidly developed from a low-income country to a high-income country. GDP growth in the city-state has been amongst the world’s highest, at an average of 7.7% since independence and topping 9.2% in the first 25 years.

View on HN

It is, but original commenter was referring to societal progress which I found interesting.

Never been to Singapore, but if there’s really low crime rate and people don’t litter on the streets - I’d call that progress.

i dont understand this focus on litter on the streets. yes clean streets is wonderful but i dont rank it anywhere near freedom of speech and social equality or something like standardized healthcare in importance.

my hunch is that "clean streets" is mostly important to those who are not sensitive to social injustice...

If you start from the proposition that the state implements the will of the people and the state's laws are just and true, then a strong state is a just state.

After all, if you can't enforce anti-littering laws, how can you hope to enforce anti-discrimination laws? To be effective at convert the law's promises into reality is a good thing, if the laws are a good thing.

Of course, I don't accept the proposition and I don't think anyone else does either - otherwise lawmakers would all have retired because their work was done.

Yeah well, people have different priorities.

If you'd stay here for a while, you'd understand why there is low crime rate and no litter on the street. What even probably surprise you more is why it's happening and what it has to do with progress. Short answer - nothing.

I can’t argue with you cause I don’t live there. But everywhere I live people complain and say government isn’t doing anything.

Singaporean here. There's low violent crime, but I wouldn't suggest that people leave their wallets and phones around in a public area.

Some people still litter on the streets, and it's shameful if one gets caught by law enforcement [1]. Singapore hires lots of cleaners to clean it up. We're nowhere as gracious as the residents of Japan or Taiwan.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corrective_work_order

> We're nowhere as gracious as the residents of Japan or Taiwan.

I don't know enough about Taiwan to comment, but the 'cleanliness' of Japanese is exaggerated in many ways:

1) there's a very large population of smokers and I see them everyday throwing their cigarette butts on the streets.

2) yes, Japanese tend to be quite clean when people are looking (social pressure). However, go in places where nobody's there or nobody's watching, like mountains, and you will see massive amounts of litter dropped by hikers. Go on a beach that's not too frequented, and find out someone did a barbecue party the night before and left all their trash behind. Come back from a firework at night and watch your step as you walk on thousands of plastic bento boxes dropped on the floor after consumption.

So, let's tone down the myths a little.

Can attest this being not the case, unless you are a bank, and can hire gazillion of local barristers to keep up with frequently changing regulatory theatrics.

For example, labour laws are faaar from what people imagine of Singapores ultracapitalist image.

I had a friend that worked there for a few years. He was all set to come home for a holiday and management waltzed in and just told everybody holidays were suspended. He still got to come home as he was something of a special case but it was a good story for us ...

Also the legend of the bank who called a fire drill then revoked everyone’s security when they were out of the building and told them they were laid off ...

Yes, fire at will is there, on the other hand you have quite potent wrongful termination lawsuits, and a number of hiring quotas which are often enforced.

Singapore is probably the only country which would force a business to hire somebody with clinically severe mental development issues.

> Singapore is probably the only country which would force a business to hire somebody with clinically severe mental development issues.

On the other hand, mental conditions are heavily stigmatised in Singapore.

No government-linked company (and Singapore's sovereign wealth fund has its fingers in most large and up-and-coming companies here) would hire someone on a career track if they have a diagnosed mental condition of some sort, anxiety and depression included.

Public health insurance downplays the severity of most mental conditions, but the status quo seems to be slowly improving: https://www.tnp.sg/news/singapore/move-include-addictions-se...

I actually have family there, and they have literally transitioned from near poverty to upper middle class in 2 decades. This was pretty widespreadc, but gradually becoming forgotten as the younger generations grow up in comforts that their precessors never knew.

A lot of this is due to their education system. It can be outright propaganda at times, but it has proven very effective at increasing literacy nation wide.

They've also made internet access an strategic initiative. When you marry a literate population with (generally, wink wink) free access to information and a seemingly draconian government, you get a very interesting bunch of people.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com