Best AHM / SBR Ever

I've always hated running. But once every other year or so, I find myself running 21km. Usually it's quite a torturous experience, but this year was different. It's not that I trained particularly hard, but I guess I put a bit more planning into it, and that made it so much faster and more painless.

Unlike past AHMs, this one had no boredom or morale problems, no joint pains, no stitches, no abrasions and no running out of energy towards the end of the race. I clocked by best time in 10 years, almost equally my personal best from OCS days, and ended the race feeling just great! If I had known I would finished in such great shape I would probably have run faster a shaved off a few more minutes... maybe next time. So I'm going to record what works for me for future reference.

First, I should give credit where credit is due. I think the organisers this year did a great job with the new route. For one thing, it is no longer the Shears Bridge Run but has been renamed to the Singapore Bay Run, and for good reason. We don't have to run up Shears Bridge anymore. Perhaps more significantly, we didn't have to run down East Coast Park and back, and that was great because you don't get the feeling that every step forward you take will be a step back later. Because I never bothered to look at the route beforehand, it was very refreshing to keep guessing where the next turn would be, and since I have never been to the bay area before a lot of the route was very refreshing. So that definitely helped the mental part of the race. There was also no waiting at traffic lights, something that was rather annoying at past races.

On the downside, the new route has several very narrow stretches around the Kallang Basin that make overtaking difficult, so this resulted in a lot of weaving in and out, braking, and wasting energy. It was very nice of the organisers to provide very nice 2XU running tops to all the Army participants. But this made the human landscape a little more boring ... and you can't chuckle to yourself every time you run past a commando if you can't tell who the commandos are.

On the personal level, one key difference this year is probably that I wanted to do my best for this race. Unfortunately work commitments prevented me from training as much as I would have wanted ... so what's new? But several other parts of my strategy went really well.

The first thing I did was buy a pair of new shoes. On the recommendation of several friends, I went to find a pair that would suit my running style and remove the pain in my knees and ankles that has plagued me every year. I first went to Running Lab where they made me run barefoot on the treadmill and pronounced that I was mildly over-pronated. But I didn't like the shoes there because they were all too heavy. I asked the salesman why they didn't carry lighter shoes and he said the lighter shoes will only last 200-300km while the heavier ones will last 500-800km. In my mind I was going "hahahah what makes you think I will run anywhere near 300km??" So I ended up in Queensway where the sales man just took one look at the way I was standing at the shoe rack and told me my feet slanted inward (i.e. overpronated). He had quite a few very nice lightweight shoes, and I ended up with my favourite brand - a pair of Mizuno Wave Elixir 6 which has served me very well ever since. No more pain in the joints!

Solving the abrasions part turned out to be fairly easy. A tub of vaseline and a few plasters did the trick. I was in a bit of a dilemma whether or not to wear underwear when I realised my new running shorts had a horrible mesh inner lining which was both very loose and lacking support, and also rather revealing. Not to mention I hated the colour. After the race ended, I realised everyone else had ditched the stupid shorts! No more abrasions!

For the past few years, I have found myself completely out of energy once I reach the 16-17km mark of the run. Drinking the energy drinks along the roadside seemed to help, but this year I decided to make a deliberate effort to load up carbohydrates before the race. Firstly, I didn't waste energy running for about two weeks prior to the race. This was not entirely deliberate, but mainly due to diarrhea that has been bothering me for the last few weeks (ever since I took a course of antibiotics in July). I was also eating like a pig during this time, including 1.5 times my usual portion of rice for lunch and 2 times my usual portion of pho for dinner the day before. I also had a slice of wholemeal bread and a banana before the race, in addition to my usual can of red bull. In doing this I hoped to consume both quick-release and slow-release carbohydrates. I still started to feel my energy levels dropping from about the 10km mark, and so I drank half a cup of 100 plus every 2-3 km from that point till the end of the race. In previous races, I was always very guarded about drinking for fear of getting stitches. But to my pleasant surprise, not only did I not get a stitch but I had plenty of energy all the way till the finish line. Unfortunately, it seems that I actually gained weight over this final period instead of losing it!

Technology also played a key part for me, mainly in the form of my smartphone. I think I had a great music soundtrack for this years run - Bruno Mars and Lady Gaga were great companions with a sufficiently fast beat to remind me to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Something new this year was the use of the Endomondo GPS tracker, which was great because it told me my pace every kilometer, and this reminded me to keep up the pace when I started to slow down. It also provided some interesting post-race information. I can literally see my water breaks.

The last thing I did different this year was to run alone. Usually in the past I try to run with someone at least at the beginning, but this time I went solo. Although company is nice, this had several benefits, mainly that I could run at my own pace, and it made weaving through the crowd easier. It also made it easier to work my way closer to the front right at the start of the race, and this greatly reduced the amount of overtaking later on. All that overtaking is really a waste of energy, so the less the better!

I haven't got the official time yet but I think I made it in about 1 hr 57 minutes. Unfortunately I forgot to check my phone until a few minutes after I crossed the finish line, so this estimate will have to do until I get the official timing. I thought I had set a pretty ambitious goal to come in under 2 hours, something I have not done for 10 years ... but if the next race goes just as smoothly I can definitely set my sights higher next time.

On a side note, isn't it interesting how you feel you need to pee for the entire 21km, and after the run you can drink 3 cans of 100 plus and not need to pee anymore.

So maybe now I can put running aside for a while and go back to what I've always preferred - chasing balls and discs.

Although this is not my fastest race, it is the best one ever because I didn't crawl across the finish line in agony. Here's my blog entry from 2006. Thank goodness I didn't go through that again!

The Army Half Marathon
3 km left to go
Body is shutting down,
Knees are in agony
To my left and right,
I see people by the wayside
He is nursing a cramp
She is lying on the grass
Our eyes meet
How I would love to be in that position
How she would love to be in mine
But I wouldn't trade places for an instant
3 km left to go.

Ho Chi Minh 2002 / 2011

It's been 10 years since my first visit to Ho Chi Minh. Needless to say, much has changed, just like the women.

10 years ago, the ladies were very beautiful, with sweet innocent faces marred only by bad teeth indicative of poor nutrition and dental hygiene. They hardly spoke any English. The au dais were plain and the people were thin, but there was a palpable sense of determination to work hard.

I can home from that trip sensing that this was indeed a country on the incline, and started searching for avenues to invest in it. Unfortunately, there were no instruments for private investors.

Now, the ladies seem to have lost that look of sweet innocence, although the teeth are straighter, the bodies curvier and the clothes and makeup are much more colourful. Those on hotel staff speak excellent English. And the hunger to succeed at all costs seems to have diminished.

Now there are several Vietnam mutual funds available, but I'm not so sure anymore. Perhaps this is the curse of development - with comfort and stability there is less drive to work hard. If I can see a change here in just 10 years, I wonder what a foreigner visiting Singapore comparing our parents' generation to our own would observe.

A few memories are still distinct from 10 years ago when I arrived with two friends, without any plans and just looking for adventure. There were no tours then but we found our way to the Mekong delta and the Chu Ci Tunnels; I had the most delicious coconut ever, fired a shotgun (my choice from a wide range of WWII vintage weapons) and had all sorts of interesting food like 90% alcohol rice wine, fried scorpions (crunches like cockroach) and boiled snake (chewy like rubber). The nightclubs were brand new and rather empty. And the roads were swarming with motorcycles.

I remember how we passed a shop one day selling local foodstuffs in the open. The next day we walked by again, and miraculously the same food items were now dressed in attractive packaging. We were thoroughly impressed by the entrepreneurship drive of the shopkeepers. I also remember how the taxi driver cheated us with some simple sleight of hand when returning the change, and how my companion recalled in retrospect the look of guilt and regret in his eyes, as if this was a desperate act of survival.

10 years later, we were cheated by a taxi driver again. But this time, it was entirely planned and deliberate, when he took us for a merry-go-round of the city, all the time pretending not to understand a word of English. That man looked and acted like a crook, and he probably did this all the time. And while there are still a lot motorcycles, many have been replaced by cars.

Of course in 10 years, I have changed too. I still have 2 companions, but instead of boys fresh out of NS and raring for adventure, we are now father, mother and toddler. No more adventures for us, we are just here to enjoy the food. And not street food either, the restaurant scene has improved tremendously, still at incredibly affordable prices. A basic 3-star hotel no longer suffices, we had to move to a 5-star on the edge of the city because toddler can't sleep with all the traffic noise. And although now I carry a DSLR, I take much fewer photos since my hands are full with him.

Seeing how one of my favourite cities has changed, I do miss the good old days.

Drivers and Insurance Policies

Since the last election, I have move from Serangoon Garden closer to Aljunied. In the process, I have shifted from Aljunied GRC to Marine Parade GRC.

In the last election, I took very seriously the prospect of bringing a credible opposition into government, because my vote actually counted in the most hotly-contested election. This year, I'm just taking a step back to laugh.

There has been so much talk about the need for a credible opposition in parliament. Whether we look upon them as insurance policies or co-drivers, the idea that we need more opposition in parliament to check the PAP running roughshod with their policies has really resonated with the electorate. In this respect, it is actually quite interesting to be in Marine Parade, because it would seem that most people who vote for the NSP are probably registering their displeasure at giving TPL a free ticket into parliament. Yes, Nicole Seah may be (relatively) mature, but do we really think that she (and those men behind her) are actually the credible opposition we keep talking about? So the Marine Parade vote will be more interesting as an indication of how influential new media had become in its ability to mobilise the masses.

So let's imagine what will happen if the opposition manage to win Aljunied and a few of the SMCs. That might possibly give them up to 10% of parliament, which I suppose is a decent number to promote debate. So we should expect a lot more public airing of the issues under deliberation over the next five years.

The question is whether a public airing of these issues will actually lead to better decisions. Perhaps it will lead to more populist outcomes, but are these necessarily better? And we can expect the blogs and forums to have lots of fun chewing on the debate.

Fast forward a few years to the next election. If Singapore has done even better than over the past five, the opposition in parliament will probably claim credit for the advances. Meanwhile, the PAP will probably attribute it to their effectiveness in spite of the opposition, or they might say that this goes to show their policy-making has always been sound. Of course, people will fight to claim credit over the successful ones, but that is not always easy to measure in the space of five years.

But what if things go downhill? The PAP will surely then blame the opposition in parliament for slowing down the decision-making process, or making it a popularity contest. The opposition will probably cite this as evidence that PAP isn't as good as it was made out to be anyway. Still, it would seem to me that if a lot of opposition gets in, the PAP would have a slight incentive to make these next five years not quite as good as the last.

The bottom line is that five years later, it will be very difficult to tell if having more opposition in parliament helped us. So what then, do we kick them out of parliament or give them an even larger share so that they can try again? What are our KPIs to know if having more opposition helped? Will having more debate in parliament actually improve the decisions, or will it just provide fodder for armchair critics?

So at the end of the day, it is very dangerous to vote opposition just for the sake of it. Fortunately for the opposition, they have a fair number of credible candidates this election, so that should make it much more interesting. Unfortunately none of them is in Marine Parade.

singapore's income gap

After my last post on Singapore's GDP, a friend commented that we have a record high GDP but the common person is not seeing any of it. I guess that's as good a segue as any to look into my next topic: the income gap.

This post is part of my horizon scanning research project.

The most common measure of income inequality or the income gap is the Gini Coefficient. When I first studied this ten years ago in university, I distinctly remember having the impression that Singapore had a very low Gini Coefficient.

Well according to the 2009 UN Development Programme report, Singapore had the second highest Gini Coefficient in the world after Hong Kong. Here's an article from Businessweek. In a nutshell, here are the top three winners:

No. 1 Hong Kong
Gini score: 43.4
GDP 2007 (US$ billions): 207.2
Share of income or expenditure (%)
Poorest 10%: 2.0
Richest 10%: 34.9
Ratio of income or expenditure, share of top 10% to lowest 10%: 17.8
Renowned for its high concentration of Rolls-Royces, expensive real estate, and posh shops, the Chinese special administrative region has plenty of rich who enjoy showing off their wealth. However, Hong Kong also has one of the largest public housing sectors in the world, with about half the population living in government-supported or -subsidized housing estates. The city has no minimum wage—except for domestic helpers from the Philippines, Indonesia, and other countries.

No. 2 Singapore
Gini score: 42.5
GDP 2007 (US$ billions): 161.3
Share of income or expenditure (%)
Poorest 10%: 1.9
Richest 10%: 32.8
Ratio of income or expenditure, share of top 10% to lowest 10%: 17.7
Singapore is one of the world's most open economies, and it suffered badly following the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers last year. Recently, though, the city-state's economy has rebounded, with GDP growing an annualized 14.9% rate in the third quarter compared with the previous quarter.

No. 3 U.S.
Gini score: 40.8
GDP 2007 (US$ billions): 13,751.4
Share of income or expenditure (%)
Poorest 10%: 1.9
Richest 10%: 29.9
Ratio of income or expenditure, share of top 10% to lowest 10%: 15.9
The share of income for the top percentile of Americans was 23.5% in 2007, the highest since 1928, according to Emmanuel Saez, a Berkeley economist who won the prestigious John Bates Clark Medal in April. Income for the top 0.01% hit a record-high 6.04%. And the recession may be exacerbating income inequality.

I also found an interesting analysis of Singapore's recent Gini Coefficient performance at squareCircleZ. Here's the graph that it compiled based on Straits Times data, and the observation that "The rapid rise from 2002 and spike in 2007 were due to several factors, including rapid population increases (through immigration) of higher-income people, and a subsequent boost in the overall economy. The drop in 2008 and 2009 is due to the Global Financial Crisis, where many high-paying jobs either disappeared, or bonuses were slashed."
So what does it mean for us if the income gap is widening? According to my favourite academic resource Wikipedia, there are a few broad outcomes of income inequality. These include an erosion of social cohesion (less trust and less community involvement), poorer population health (with negative impact on life expectancy, economic growth and infant mortality) and lower economic growth (Gini Coefficient of below .25 or above .40 is bad for growth).

In Singapore's case, the rise in income inequality is almost definitely due to the recent emphasis on attracting foreign talents, so an argument for the necessity of income inequality would go along the same lines: these people may seem overpaid, but they are the ones driving profits and creating employment that will eventually benefit the entire country. The lower income groups may seem relatively worse of, but in absolute terms they are still in a better position.

Mr Brown made a case against just such an argument in 2006, and it cost him his column in Today. Here's the account as reported by fellow blogger Alex Au aka Yawning Bread.

Lee Kin Mun, who writes under the pseudonym "Mr Brown", wrote a harsh, though humorous, commentary on June 30 concerning Singapore’s rising cost of living, mentioning that latest official statistics showed that one in every three Singaporean households had suffered a reduction in income over the last five years. The irony, which was not lost on the island state’s government, was that Lee cited official statistics to bolster his argument.

Of course, Mr Brown wrote that article in 2006, in the aftermath of 9/11, the dot.com bust and a worldwide recession. Looking at the numbers again, the last five years seem to have been a lot better for the average Singaporean. Here is a table put together from SingStat's Key Household Income Trends, 2009 report and the Time Series on CPI & Inflation Rate. The real change in household income is definitely overall positive for these last few years, especially 2005-2008.


Of course, someone looking to buy a car might not appreciate how much his real income has increased, as shown in this chart from Singapore Real Estate. This is also a sharp reversal of the trend that saw Cat A COE prices fall from $30,000+ in 2003 down to $10,000+ in 2008. I don't have any good data showing the price of public transport, but it's pretty clear that that is going up too. Yet the CPI measure for transport has barely moved (from 98.3 to 100) from 2005 to 2009, it will be interesting to see when the figures for 2010 are released.

And as mentioned in the previous post, someone looking to buy a house (like me) isn't exactly spoilt for choice either. The CPI measure for housing has increased almost 25% (from 84.1 to 100) from 2005 to 2009.

Lastly, here's another recent article on the cost of living in Singapore. HR Consultancy Mercer has ranked Singapore the 11th most expensive city in the world. It should be noted that this is for expatriate employees, who would not be eligible for government subsidised housing, hence clearly accomodation would be a huge chunk of their expense. Nevertheless, given our cheap food and cheap (relative to others) public transport, I'm quite surprised to see us so high on the list. Is this another wake up call?

Up till now, I've just been getting a grasp on the current situation. It is definitely worse than I thought before I started doing this research, but I'm not quite ready to draw an conclusions yet until I read a little more on income inequality. One thing is clear, as my friend pointed out, is that this could have an impact on the next election. In democracies, the lower income groups may have disproportionately small spending power, but they have equal voting power, especially when the lower income group is disproportionately large.

And finally, another interesting way to visualise the income distribution is as a parade of dwarfs and giants, as depicted by Dutch economist Jan Pen in 1971. This is the concept:

Suppose that every person in the economy walks by, as if in a parade. Imagine that the parade takes exactly an hour to pass, and that the marchers are arranged in order of income, with the lowest incomes at the front and the highest at the back. Also imagine that the heights of the people in the parade are proportional to what they make: those earning the average income will be of average height, those earning twice the average income will be twice the average height, and so on. We spectators, let us imagine, are also of average height.

Pen then described what the observers would see. Not a series of people of steadily increasing height—that’s far too bland a picture. The observers would see something much stranger. They would see, mostly, a parade of dwarves, and then some unbelievable giants at the very end.

A friend sent me the Singapore version of the parade some years back, and it is quite an interesting read. Unfortunately I cannot find it online to link to or attribute, so at the risk of making this the longest and most un-original blog post ever, I am going to reproduce it in full. I am quite curious how the parade would look today, after the foreign talent policy.

In literally the first few seconds after commencement, we observe a number of people of negative height passing. On closer inspection they look like businessmen who have suffered losses. In fact, they are not necessarily short people – some of them are awfully tall, with their feet on the ground but their heads deep in the earth; they are in a severe liquidity constrained position. The market is never sentimental – many are attracted to the successes of private enterprise, which, however pass them by. Indeed, an EPD study found that only less than half of new firms set-up survive the sixth year.

After this tragic-comic opening, tiny gnomes rush by, the size of a matchstick then a cigarette. This contingent could include: housewives who do some part-time work, school kids working at McDonalds, etc.

The heights of the next group of participants though still very small – about 3 feet – increase by leaps and bounds. They are quite a mixed bunch: they may include a few owners of small shops, but mostly people not in formal paid employment – retirees, people with physical handicaps.

The ordinary workers, about whom there is nothing out of the ordinary except that they are in the lowest jobs. The contingent of cleaners & labourers is clearly visible. The unskilled clerks and other admin workers march in front of the unskilled manual workers. We have ample opportunity to observe them at our leisure. It takes almost fifteen minutes before the passing marchers reach a height of substantially more than four feet. For the spectators it can be a rather disturbing sight: fifteen minutes is a long time to keep watching small people pass by who barely reach to our midriff. More than a third are women. In embarrassment we avert our gaze and look towards the direction of the next contingent in hope of catching sight at long last of normal height persons.

But a surprise awaits us – we keep on seeing dwarfs. They are gradually becoming a little taller, but it's a slow process. They include the masses of workers, just ordinary people from the heartlands sometimes with not inconsiderable technical knowledge - a testimony to our excellent ITE training programmes. After ten minutes, the small people approach our collar bones. We see the skilled manufacturing workers, those from our polytechnics. There are also office workers, all respectable persons.

We are now half-hour into the parade; we know that the entire event will last an hour and hope to be able to look at the marchers straight in the eye, this is not so. We still look down on the top of their heads, and even in the distance we do not pick up an obvious improvement.

It is after 45 minutes or about 12 minutes before the end that the average income recipients pass by. We are interested in who these people are and crane our necks to get a better look: SBS bus drivers, lower grade teachers and civil servants, some IT people, older NCOs in the SAF, shopkeepers, sales representatives, insurance agents, foremen.

After the average income recipients have passed, the scene changes rather quickly. The marchers' height grows; seven minutes later we see the arrival of the top 10%. The head of this group to our surprise are still people with fairly modest jobs: school principals, analysts at brokerage firms, small contractors (PCK Ltd?), mid-ranking army officers (perhaps up to the rank of Colonel), SilkAir pilots. These are people who never thought they belonged to the top ten percent. Again office staff, department/division heads, but not the genuine top executives.

In the last few minutes, giants suddenly loom. A lawyer, not exceptionally successful, 18 feet tall. A Brigadier-General of similar height. Some (private sector) doctors come into sight, engineers at the large pharmaceutical companies.

There is still one minute to go, and now we see towering fellows. A Permanent Secretary about thirteen yards tall, a High Court judge, CEOs of some GLCs, eye surgeons, corporate lawyers.

During the last seconds, the scene is dominated by colossal figures. Most of them prove to be successful businessmen, managing directors of large firms sitting on many boards, top TCS stars.

The rear of the parade is brought up by a few participants who are measured in miles; their heads disappear into the clouds – Khoo Teck Puat, Kwek Leng Beng, Wee Cho Yaw and perhaps Olivia Lum.

Suddenly the parade is gone – the income recipients disappear from sight.

It appears that we have organised a parade of dwarfs. Indeed, a striking fact is that we had to wait so long for the average income recipient. This of course reflects the rich people bringing up the rear. Not only do they attract the attention of the spectator so much, but they also raise the average; it shifts to well above the great mass of income recipients. For that reason by far the greater part of the parade consists of small men and women, and not to mention the dwarfs. If we were to exclude from the parade those who bring up the rear, say during the last minute, the average height would drop considerably. Those remaining in the parade would not become taller mind you, but the impression would be removed that we have organised a parade of dwarfs.

Each of us has a particular spot in the marching contingents at every parade. Each of us is a participant and witness of a dramatic spectacle.

will the casino save us?

The headlines of 2010 and 2008 are an interesting contrast.

Singapore officially in recession, 21 Nov 2008, BBC
Singapore's economy shrank between July and September, confirming it was the first Asian country in recession in the current financial crisis.

Singapore May Pass China as Asia's Fastest-Growing Economy, 9 Jul 2010, Bloomberg
Singapore may overtake China as Asia’s fastest-growing economy this year

This post is part of my horizon scanning research project.

From the first country in Asia to enter recession to the fastest growing economy in the world. What is the significance of this?

1. Is this just an indicator of how reliant we are on international trade; are we merely a volatile indicator of the health of the world's economy?

2. Does the answer lie in PM Lee's national day message? "This exceptional performance is the fruit of Singaporeans’ united response during the crisis. This enabled us to take full advantage of improved global conditions." Have we improved the fundamentals of our economy, to fare better in the future regardless of fair or foul business conditions?
3. Or is this just the coincidental timing of the opening of our two new Integrated Resorts, and the flood of foreign investment and tourism they have brought with them. And if so, will this rush last, and how sensitive will it be to future business cycles?

I've been asking myself these questions because of a bigger question in my mind. How well will Singapore weather a double dip recession, if we get hit by one in the near future?

After several weeks of surfing the net in my spare time, I'm no closer to finding the answer to these questions. I have, however, made a few interesting observations, particularly about the third point.

The graph below from SingStat shows manufacturing is on the decline. The growth industries over the last few years are construction and business services, both of which are probably influenced greatly by casino-related activities in the past five years. So the casino definitely has had a positive impact, and the question remains whether this impact will be long-term, and how sensitive it will be to business cycles.

Tourism as an industry seems to be quite susceptible to the health of the global economy. Singapore's own visitor arrivals reflect this, with dips corresponding with the recession in 2001-2003 and the global financial crisis from 2007-2009.
Since I can't find any research on the sensitivity of casinos to the economic cycle, the next best thing was a dataset provided by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. This allows me to view GDP data by industry and metropolitan area over the last ten years. So for example, I can see how the GFC has affected the gambling and entertainment industries in Las Vegas and Atlantic City. I can also compare it to the growth of other core industries such as Finance in NYC and Chicago, or a mix of industries in Philadelphia as controls.

This table shows the absolute GPD figures for each metropolitan area and industry

This chart show normalised growth rates by dividing the GDP by the first year

The first observation is that Las Vegas did really well, in fact both its gaming and hospitality industries did the best over the eight-year period. Atlantic City was also growing in the later years. So maybe they really are immune to economic trends. But then again, the third best performer is the finance industry of New York. Is it possible that the global financial crisis - the worst recession since the great depression - missed Wall Street?

The Economics of Casino Gambling seems to be the most widely cited paper on the topic of the economics of the casino industry. And while it didn't answer my questions, I did learn quite a bit about casinos.

• Social resistance to the casinos will probably be a passing phase. Gambling and casinos were illegal and frowned upon in most U.S. states until the 1970's, because of concerns that introducing casinos would bring with them many social problems. Sounds familiar? And most of the policies introduced to mitigate these social concerns were more symbolic than effective. Having been to both Las Vegas and Atlantic City, and the surroundings, I don't recall much overt opposition to the casinos in the present day.


• The casino might lead to growth that is sustainable over a decent length of time. "Nevada was among the three fastest growing states in the United States for each of the last four decades of the 20th century. Nevada's major city, Las Vegas, was one of the five fastest growing metropolitan areas in the country in each decade over the same period."

On the bright side, if we do go into recession again, housing might become affordable again.

the folly of god's sacrifice

I saw an interesting video excerpt from the recent Global Atheist Convention in Melbourne.

On a forum, the celebrity atheist Richard Dawkins is ridiculing the fact that the omnipotent God of Christians could find no other way to save mankind from their sins than to sacrifice his son.

Edit: Thanks to Cal, I now have the link to the actual video (from 4:15 onwards), and his exact words below.

You believe in the New Testament that God, the all-powerful creator of the universe, couldn't think of a better way to forgive humanity's sins than to have himself put on earth, tortured and executed in atonement for the sins of humanity. What kind of a horrible depraved notion is that?

The Christian on the panel, who was obviously not chosen for his debating skills, could only weakly affirm that yes, this is what Christians believe, while the audience roared with laughter.

It annoyed me a bit that the Christian panelist had no explanation, but I'd probably have forgotten about it if the same Christian doctrine hadn't come up in a book I was reading later that same day.

In the Life of Pi, Pi is 14 when he first encounters the story of Jesus, and his reaction is very similar to Richard Dawkins. The son of a zookeeper, this is how he describes it:

The first thing that drew me in was disbelief. What? Humanity sins but it’s God’s Son who pays the price? I tried to imagine my Father saying to me, “Piscine, a lion slipped into the llama pen today and killed two llamas. Yesterday another one killed a black buck. Last week two of them ate the camel. The week before it was painted storks and grey herons. And who’s to say for sure who snacked on our golden agouti? The situation has become intolerable. Something must be done. I have decided that the only way the lions can atone for their sins is if I feed you to them.”

“Yes, Father, that would be the right and logical thing to do. Give me a moment to wash up.”

“Hallelujah, my son.”

“Hallelujah, Father.”

Pi constrasts this pathetically weak god to the awesome Hindu gods he knows. Rama, Krishna, Bhraman; all would never allow themselves to be subjected to such indignity. How could this happen? Love. That was Father Martin’s answer. (The full excerpt of this encounter can be found here.)

A third perspective on God's sacrifice is a story I once heard, which I will try to reproduce here.

A judge with a great reputation for justice one day has to preside over his own son for an extremely severe offence.

The judge loves his son dearly, and would like nothing better than to give him a light sentence. But he is duty-bound to uphold the law and sentences his son to death.

He then pronounces that the law also allows someone to die in his son's place, and he chooses to do so for his son.

Just as we would not respect a leader who makes rules but does not keep them, so I think we would not respect a God who changes the rules at his own whim and fancy, just because he can. This is a story about consistency and faithfulness. It is also a story, as Pi learned, of love.

I also got another interesting perspective from Pi on atheists and agnostics. Pi is the Indian son of a zookeeper, who goes on to double major in zoology and religious studies in Toronto. He has been variously a Hindu, a Christian and a Muslim ... I haven't finished the book yet. Many of his fellow scientists are atheists, and this is how he describes them:

Atheists are my brothers and sisters of a different faith, and every word they speak, speaks of faith. Like me, they go as far as the legs of reason will carry them – and then they leap.

It is not atheists who get stuck in my craw, but agnostics. Doubt is useful for a while. We must all pass through the garden of Gethsemane. If Christ played with doubt, so must we. If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.

(Thanks to Cori for transcribing these quotes. She has a very interesting Christian blog, together with her atheist husband.)

He finds it amazing that some people can believe a supreme being exists, but not be bothered to figure out who it is or what it is like. I find myself nodding in agreement.

horizon scanning: trends and challenges for singapore

I have often asked myself what the biggest challenges facing Singapore's survival are. Ten years ago, I was afraid our manufacturing economy would be crushed by low-cost labour in China, and that we were too exposed to global financial markets. Today, I worry that the greatest dangers are internal: loss of national identity with the influx of PRs and foreign talents, and the growing income gap. The truth is, I don't know.

So over the next few months, I will try to compile a list of the possible threats to our future survival, prioritise and research each one to understand it better. Hopefully at the end of this exercise, I'll be able to form a more educated opinion on the question I posed above. And for whoever else is interested, perhaps this will be an interesting exercise too.

Comments and suggestions are welcome, the first step is to compile the list of trends (and some of the direct effects) that will shape our future. That can be found at the bottom of the page. From that list, I'm also posing myself some questions, which I hope to answer soon.

Questions

1. How will Singapore be affected by a double-dip recession, and how has the casino affected the resilience of our economy and our exposure to the rest of the world?
2. What are the biggest military threats to Singapore, and are we equipped to handle them? What else needs to be done?
3. How will the combination of declining birth rate, Singaporeans working overseas and increasing immigration affect our identity as Singaporeans and national institutions such as national service?
4. What are the threats to racial and religious harmony in Singapore, and what is the significance of recent government actions to restrict certain activities among religious groups?
5. What does the rise of China mean for Singapore? How will it affect our economic, diplomatic and defence policies? How will it affect our society?
6. Taking into account recent changes in CPF policy (such as cuts in employer contributions), is this system able to to support our aging population?

This list will continue to grow and priorities may shift, as I do more preliminary research into the list below.

General Trends (Laundry list of ideas)

Global
Dependence on Global Economy
- Double dip recession
- Global impact on local export-led economy
- Decline of USD as world reserve currency
- Revaluation of Yuan
- Impact of casino
- Status as trade and transport hub
Security Threats
- Terrorism
- Cyber Crime / Cyber Warfare
- Conventional threats
Globalisation
- Decline of nation-state, national identity and nationalism
- Growing PR population and NS
- Brain Drain
Rising China
- Risk of global power transition / contest for influence in Southeast Asia
- Conflict over Taiwan / Spratly Islands

Regional
- Political and ethnic instability in Malaysia
- Political unrest in Thailand
- Resolution of longstanding bilateral issues
- Relations with neighbours

Domestic
Aging population / Declining birth rate
Racial and religious harmony
Growing income gap
Income Tax and CPF
Environment
- Environmental Damage and Pollution
- Water

Useful References
Statistics - Economic Indicators (Singstat charts)
4 Challenges Facing Singapore (National Day Rally 2009)