Not all other prices are set by competition. There's much manipulation through things like subsidies, tariffs, tax incentives, and bailouts.
Also, having lived in Singapore for years, it's a wonderful city and I love it, but the wage story isn't necessarily one to mimic. It might look grand as a foreigner, but your cleaning lady is probably sharing a 3 bedroom apartment with 16+ other women and doesn't see her family more than a few times a year.
And, yet, she still makes more money than in her home country.
Re:Fed Ends Zero-Rate Era
by TheOtherHobbes on Thursday December 17, 2015 @02:39AM
(#10750137)
And spends almost all of it on rent.
At least they are building up like crazy. No NIMBYs there.
Re:Fed Ends Zero-Rate Era
by crdoconnor on Wednesday December 16, 2015 @06:47PM
(#10748339)
Singapore wages aren't zero but they are really low for the non-managerial classes (i.e. the people who do all the work) and oversized for the managerial classes.
It's about 3x the size of San Francisco and clearly has aspirations of becoming a similar center for startups but with the prevailing wages for the people who do all the actual work so low the quality of what is produced is usually shitty.
It's not a place you'd want to emulate.
Singapore doesn't have a minimum, and wages there are not zero. (Neither did Germany until recently.)