According to the Singapore National Trades Union Congress reported in by Pakistan's Jang Group newspapers, 42,000 jobs have been lost in Singapore over 5 years.

Job losses are a result of lower wage, land and business costs in such places as Malaysia, Thailand, China, the Philippines and Indonesia as business shifts to these locations to save on costs. As the quality of labour and labour efficency improves in these countries, companies who have based in Singapore for many years for its efficiencies and high labour skills, are finding that other countries can now offer these - and at a lower price.

The NTUC is not a trade union in the normally accepted understanding of the phrase. In Singapore the top trade unionist works in the government as a cabinet minister, rather than representing workers directly.

But the message is still clear - and its a wake up call to Singapore that the world is changing. Richer countries like the US, many European countries and Singapore itself, as one of the most wealth country countries worldwide, will inevitably find their standard of living reducing as countries with cheaper labour manufacture goods cheaper. It is no surprise that the US trade unions are major participants in all anti-globalization anti-WTO protests. The import of high quality goods manufactured by cheaper labour threatens workers salary levels and jobs.

Extract: "These jobs will not come back. They have gone to China, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand where land and labour costs are lower," said the report headlined "Going, going, gone: Companies relocate to lower-cost countries". "The casualty rates over such a prolonged period clearly spells out the harsh reality for workers -- these types of jobs are leaving Singapore and they are not returning." NTUC secretary general Lim Boon Heng, who is also a cabinet minister with responsibility for the prime minister's office, told the Straits Times Monday the only way to stem job losses was to lower wage costs."

Singapore's continuing quest to maintain it's competitiveness is threatened by globalization and the increasing competitiveness of others. However as previous news items suggest, Singapore's strategists are on the job. What has not been made clear yet, is that wages and salaries must decline regardless of any increase in education or job skills. It's just that Singapore will be competing with a different set of countries, some far away from the Asian region - and these countries also compete on costs...