Watching our Parliament debate is like watching a horror movie

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An honorable member of the Coffee Shop Has Just Posted the Following:

I managed to catch a couple of minutes of the news when the CPF was discussed. They were talking about the withdrawal of CPF on retirement. The argument went something like this. The govt allowed CPF members to withdraw their money in one lump sum at 55 at a time when life was short. The people were expected to die in 5 or 7 years after retiring at 55. Today, life expectancy is 82, so there is a need to ensure that people have the money to spend after retirement. Letting them have the money at one go and at too early an age would mean depleting the saving faster.

Jumping onto this logic, Lim Bee Wah asked the govt to consider working backwards from 82 to allow the people to get a lump sum on retirement. Most retirees are looking forward to touch their life time savings when they retired. Chuan Jin’s reply, extending the logic of longer lifespan, it was not possible to know how long people would live after 82. They could go on living and it was necessary to make sure that they have money to go on living.

Here came my goose pimples, and my hair stood on ends. Fear crept up and I was really frightened, like watching a horror movie. No, Chuan Jin and Lim Bee Wah did not turn into Dracula or vampire. It was this sense of wholesome goodness for the people, so caring and so earnest to want the people to live well till their last day. I cannot imagine that there are really people that are so virtuous, so good and so genuine in this world to really want to help other people. No, don’t get me wrong. Chuan Jin was really sincere in wanting to help the retirees. I would have doubts if it was someone else selling his koyok.

It was too good to be true. And the scary part is that it was true. And they are going to make sure that the retirees will have the money to spend, and no lump sum return of their savings, and the payback will be delayed for as long as possible to make the money last, perhaps another 100 years. Oops, I shouldn’t say that. They might believe people will live to 200 years and make your CPF savings provide for it. Bad idea to say that. And the people will have to leave their money with the CPF for a very very long time. Irene Yap, or is it Renee Yap, should not gripe about withdrawing her money in the CPF. Going forward, CPF retirees would be expected to leave their money in the CPF to last them their life time being alive.

This is now a case of better to overprovide than underprovide. Chuan Jin is right to say that no one can predict how long a person would live beyond 82. But he was silence on how many would not live beyond 55 or 60. Anyway, this part is not important as they would not be a burden to themselves or to the state if they die young.

Gan Kim Yong should follow the same principles in his Medishield Life scheme. I think Gan Kim Yong is doing the opposite by providing the minimum, B2/C wards intead of A wards or private hospital wards. Should not Gan Kim Yong follow the same logic, provide for the best, for all contingencies like Chuan Jin? Or why don’t Chuan Jin borrow the principle of Gan Kim Yong, provide for the basics or minimum, and the extra or excessive part would be an option? Gan Kim Yong may be providing for B2/C wards but the people can opt for better wards by voluntarily paying more. For a compulsory across the board scheme, this is a sensible approach.

In the case of the CPF, the govt can go for the best, though it claimed to be using the lower income Singaporean as the benchmark, as the money to be retained in the CPF comes from the people themselves. If the money is to come from the govt, would the govt use the same yardstick, to demand the people to keep so much money in the CPF/minimum sum after retirement?

I still remember the saying, when the govt says it wants to help you, is so serious and happy and voluntarily offering to help you, be frighten, be very frighten. The thought of saving enough CPF to live up to 100 years or 200 years is really damn scary. I could not sleep the whole night. It was a frightening display of human goodness at its extreme. You don’t need enemies if you have people thinking like that and planning your life and your money…for your own good.

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