Globalisasi, Liberalisasi dan Ketaksamaan

Cheh! That’s how ‘easy' it is to translate from English into Malay and vice versa. You’re not convinced? Lemme give you another (bad) example:

Salah-satu fokus penting RMK-9 adalah untuk mentransformasikan enterpris kecil dan sederhana (EKS) kepada entiti berintensifkan pengetahuan dan pembentukan nilai dengan penekanan terhadap penggunaan teknologi tinggi dan juga pengeluaran produk dengan nilai tambah yang tinggi.

Which comes from my introductory paragraph (that originally came from RMK-9 lah –the publication):

One of the focuses in RMK-9 is to transform small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs) into knowledge-intensive and value-creating entities that emphasize upon usage of high technology and production of products with higher value added.

Er, I’m not sure about men-transformation-kan but enterpris is totally a valid usage ok (refer Kamus Dewan – DBP and DOS)!

Back to yesterday’s public lecture –as part of the 5oth Merdeka Celebration– the Y. Bhg. Prof who delivered the lecture is currently holding the position of Naib Setiausaha Agong PBB blahblah… – hand-picked by TYT K. Annan (missed his previous 5oth Merdeka Celebration public lecture via video conference) no less!

I’m not poking fun at him (the Prof not KA) or anybody else (I mean no disrespect really) – after all we’re all God’s creations. Everybody has their own quirks – remember that I’ve the habit of stating my points with “Basically..” (berapa banyak punya ‘basically2x’ daa…P.Ramlee - this week on campus with his movies showing at Pg.Seni & singing competition - tonite in case you’re are around & interested) while my No.1 prefers “I dunno know whether you know this or not..” and No.3 “I’m sure you already think of this somehow/along the way BUT …” – which are totally annoying (at the very least) to the listeners – whoever (unlucky) you are, hehehe. So, I couldn’t help it but to notice this (Aaargh! It’s not like my whole reason of being there was to listen to this peculiarity) - the way he pronounced ‘banyak’ sound funny-like ‘banyiak’. After I started to notice it, he kept on saying (it and only) it again and again – maybe I’m (the only one) too sensitive to ‘banyak’-word eh?

And for your info, I totally j’adore him (his mastery (kesarjanaan) of economics issues ye)!

Now, back to Globalisation, Liberalisation and Unequality – the main issue is of course unequality. Yes, countries are mostly growing economically, per capita incomes are increasing yadda-yadda.. BUT only the rich is getting richer while the poor remains poorer, i.e. market capitalism. We don’t need to look very far to see the evidence of this growing gap/disparity – throw in the self-acclaimed DEB (the very much contented sore point amongst the Bumis and Non-Bumis) – yes, now we have the x% nouveau riche Malays which controlled the XX% (something like that lah – I dunno know any ‘real’ figure) newly minted/created wealth. Where does this put the rest of us? The majority middle-income groups people? Is there really any difference amongst the Malays, Chinese & Indians? And other ethnicity? Who has to struggle everyday with the price increases from toll-hikes, petrol etc.? So, it’s the same argument elsewhere with the North-South, or the Centre and peripheries (the way we consider US of A as the center of the world –bleh!), blahblah. Didya get that email (circulating on and off- incoming again today) about how la to live in KL with RM3000 a month? (Mind you, I received a very, very much less than that stated amount, for now – haiyah…) How about those receiving RM350 a month? Makes you wonder eh… And the government is saying NO to raising the minimum wage –nanti pelabur asing lari (BTW, everybody is goin’ to China nowadays)!

Yes, we’ve perhaps zero-ed hard-core poverty. But there’s still poor people living in Malaysia (below poverty line) …

He also said among other things - Go glokal! Enuf about bein’ a Malay or Chinese or Indian or other races. We should now be proud of bein’ simply Malaysians! Or citizens of the world. Start thinking..

On unrelated note - Enuf about all those conspiracy theories. (What? what?)

Economists from the beginning of time (till the end of time) will always discuss the Big Tradeoff between principle of efficiency (getting the most out of a given input - on resource allocations) and equality (in distribution). Okun (1975) said the income disparities serve as incentives to promote efficiency. Any economic policies designed to reduce the scope and magnitude of inequality will weaken or impair efficiency. Just look at any socialist economy for example!

In Islam, we've the principle of ‘adl’ – adil means meletakkan sesuatu pada tempatnya. Thru Zakat, sadakah...

Or, there’s always (Kevin Costner’s) Robinhood’s matlamat tak menghalalkan cara.
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DSAI popularized words like
– ma(m)pan e.g. pertumbuhan ekonomi yang ma(m)pan and also
– mantan e.g. mantan PM
And yet yesterday, I heard for more than 10 times – “Dasa warsa ini…” Pergh!!!
Ain’t that bombastic or what? Hm, I’m learning…your guess as to what that is?