https://www.scmp.com/rss/330368/feed en https://assets.i-scmp.com/static/img/icons/scmp-meta-1200x630.png https://www.scmp.com Donald Low Donald Low Few cities have managed to shake off an industrial past as thoroughly as Kaohsiung. Once defined by its shipyards, heavy industry and petrochemicals, Taiwan’s third largest city has undergone a transformation that is nothing short of remarkable. In the last two decades, Kaohsiung has become a green, services-oriented cultural city. While it lacks the scale, resources and iconic urban attractions of Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore or Dubai, the home of Taiwan’s second busiest airport exudes a... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3333732/reinventing-kaohsiung-taiwans-port-city-transcends-its-industrial-past?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3333732/reinventing-kaohsiung-taiwans-port-city-transcends-its-industrial-past?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 22 Nov 2025 05:30:09 +0000 Donald Low,Thomas Lam Chun-kai Donald Low,Thomas Lam Chun-kai Thailand is often hailed as a poster child for the “China plus one” strategy, its industrial estates filled with new factories and its policymakers touting investment in electric vehicles and electronics. Thanks to its established industrial infrastructure, a domestic market of nearly 100 million people and its well-integrated presence in global automotive and electronics supply chains, Thailand is naturally positioned to attract advanced manufacturing firms seeking diversification away from... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3331987/thailands-china-plus-one-successes-mask-middle-income-quagmire?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3331987/thailands-china-plus-one-successes-mask-middle-income-quagmire?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 08 Nov 2025 04:00:14 +0000 Hong Kong’s budget for financial year 2025-26, unveiled earlier this week by Financial Secretary Paul Chan, was notable for the paucity of measures that might address the structural challenges facing the city’s economy. It was mainly focused on cost-cutting and belt-tightening to narrow the budget deficit, which the government has run in all but one of the last six financial years. Chan pledged to return the operating account to surplus in financial year 2026-27. This is unlikely: the economy... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3300600/how-hong-kongs-budget-deficits-can-be-catalyst-restructure-economy?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3300600/how-hong-kongs-budget-deficits-can-be-catalyst-restructure-economy?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 01 Mar 2025 07:00:10 +0000 Global tourism has staged a dramatic comeback from the depths of the Covid-19 pandemic, with 1.1 billion international tourists recorded in the first nine months of 2024 – tantalisingly close to pre-pandemic levels. Asia, in particular, has witnessed a remarkable recovery with countries like Japan surpassing their 2019 tourism numbers. But Hong Kong’s rebound has been noticeably slower. This year’s tourist arrivals are projected to fall short of the Tourism Board’s modest target of 46 million –... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3290721/forget-night-vibes-hong-kong-needs-tourism-lessons-singapore-tokyo-and-seoul?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3290721/forget-night-vibes-hong-kong-needs-tourism-lessons-singapore-tokyo-and-seoul?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 15 Dec 2024 01:00:15 +0000 Despite being one of the first populous Southeast Asian countries to achieve middle-income status in the early 1990s, Thailand has struggled to escape the middle-income trap. Its gross domestic product per capita last year was about US$7,000 – just over half of China and neighbouring Malaysia. The Asian financial crisis in 1997-98, which originated in Thailand, savaged the country’s economy, destabilised its banks and financial system, and set back its development prospects. It took Thailand... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3282972/why-thailand-failed-escape-middle-income-trap?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3282972/why-thailand-failed-escape-middle-income-trap?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 20 Oct 2024 04:30:08 +0000 Last week, the World Bank released its annual World Development Report. Titled “The Middle-Income Trap”, the report observes that while most countries are able to get from low- to middle-income, getting from middle- to high-income is much less common and far more difficult. As the report points out, development strategies that served countries well when they were still low-income – especially high capital investment – yield diminishing returns when these countries reach middle-income status.... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3280285/how-south-korea-avoided-middle-income-trap-grow-and-diversify-its-economy?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3280285/how-south-korea-avoided-middle-income-trap-grow-and-diversify-its-economy?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 28 Sep 2024 03:00:18 +0000 Since the middle of last year, it was evident that the Chinese economy faced two major risks. The first was that deflationary expectations would depress private spending and investment. In a deflationary environment, households are less likely to spend on items financed by borrowing, while firms cut back on hiring and investing in anticipation of wages and other costs falling. This keeps credit demand weak and renders lower interest rates less effective in boosting domestic demand. The second... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3275640/restore-consumer-confidence-china-must-save-property-sector?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/china-opinion/article/3275640/restore-consumer-confidence-china-must-save-property-sector?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 27 Aug 2024 01:30:08 +0000 Last month, Pinduoduo (PDD) reported surprisingly strong first-quarter results, with group revenue reaching 86.81 billion yuan (US$12 billion), exceeding Wall Street analysts’ estimate of 75.66 billion yuan. Net profit also saw a significant increase, reaching 28 billion yuan, up by 246 per cent year on year. These results pleased overseas investors and shareholders. However, the success of an e-commerce company like PDD, which focuses on low prices and the low-end consumer market and helps... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3267593/why-pinduoduos-surprise-growth-may-not-be-good-news-chinas-economy?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3267593/why-pinduoduos-surprise-growth-may-not-be-good-news-chinas-economy?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 22 Jun 2024 03:00:16 +0000 At first glance, China’s first-quarter gross domestic product numbers seem to validate the state’s reliance on production to boost a slowing economy. Compared to the same period last year, GDP in the first quarter grew by 5.3 per cent, driven by a 6.1 per cent increase in industrial production and a 9.9 per cent increase in manufacturing investments. But data from March points to the limits of relying on investment to sustain growth. The National Bureau of Statistics reported on Tuesday that... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3261358/what-china-must-learn-japans-decades-long-debt-deflation-slowdown?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3261358/what-china-must-learn-japans-decades-long-debt-deflation-slowdown?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 05 May 2024 02:30:11 +0000 The main takeaway from the recently concluded “two sessions” in Beijing is that China is intent on achieving dominance and technological parity (if not leadership) in a wide range of industries. The Chinese leadership clearly believes that boosting investments in what it calls “new productive forces” is how China will achieve growth of around 5 per cent in 2024 and beyond. But is this strategy the correct one for China? And is it desirable for other countries, especially developing ones that are... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3256422/chinas-drive-industrial-dominance-likely-hurt-developing-countries-and-itself?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3256422/chinas-drive-industrial-dominance-likely-hurt-developing-countries-and-itself?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 24 Mar 2024 03:00:25 +0000 Faced with a deficit of more than HK$100 billion (US$12.8 billion) this financial year, the Hong Kong government has proposed issuing bonds to finance large-scale infrastructure projects that could include the Northern Metropolis and land reclamation on Lantau Island. This proposal makes sense. Hong Kong’s public debt to gross domestic product ratio is extremely low by international standards; the government therefore has the space and creditworthiness to borrow more – even though interest rates... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3252994/how-infrastructure-borrowing-can-benefit-hong-kong-decades-come?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3252994/how-infrastructure-borrowing-can-benefit-hong-kong-decades-come?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 24 Feb 2024 02:00:17 +0000 The Hong Kong economy has had a lost half decade. It shrank in two of the last five years; 3.2 per cent GDP growth last year did not make up for the 3.5 per cent contraction in 2022. Growth in the coming years may continue to be sluggish as the mainland Chinese economy grapples with high levels of debt – especially in property – excess capacity and insufficient demand, deflationary pressures, and a persistent decline in asset values. Hong Kong’s economic woes should trigger a deep rethink of... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3252238/hong-kongs-economy-needs-reinvention-become-more-just-chinas-superconnector-after-lost-half-decade?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3252238/hong-kongs-economy-needs-reinvention-become-more-just-chinas-superconnector-after-lost-half-decade?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 18 Feb 2024 03:00:11 +0000 The Hong Kong economy probably grew by just over 3 per cent in 2023. Considering that it shrank by 3.5 per cent in 2022, growth last year hardly made up for the contraction the year before. The economy today is not much bigger than it was at the end of 2018; The Economist magazine describes the last five years as a lost half-decade. Growth in the coming year could continue to be sluggish, not least because the mainland is grappling with the end of the debt-fuelled bubble in real estate,... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3249068/hong-kong-needs-consider-introducing-sales-tax-plug-financing-gaps-removing-us-dollar-peg?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3249068/hong-kong-needs-consider-introducing-sales-tax-plug-financing-gaps-removing-us-dollar-peg?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 20 Jan 2024 02:00:21 +0000 After the US Federal Reserve chair Jay Powell gave the clearest signal yet that the United States central bank would begin to cut rates next year, investors responded by sending the benchmark S&P index to its highest level since January 2022. Even if the market rally is short-lived, this does not detract from the fact that the Fed and the US economy have surprised on the upside this year. In much of 2022, the Fed was criticised for having underestimated the risk of inflation during a pandemic in... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3245657/why-china-should-allow-diverse-viewpoints-its-economy-avoid-risks-3-biases?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3245657/why-china-should-allow-diverse-viewpoints-its-economy-avoid-risks-3-biases?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 19 Dec 2023 13:38:08 +0000 At the start of this year, the conventional wisdom among analysts studying China was that the economy would come roaring back to life and easily beat the government’s modest growth forecast. The US economy, meanwhile, was tipped to face a recession amid repeated interest-rate increases to bring down inflation that was running at close to 40-year highs. The reality has turned out to be quite the opposite. 2023 will be remembered as the year that the Chinese economy struggled to deal with falling... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3242732/what-hong-kong-must-do-prepare-years-weaker-growth-mainland-china?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3242732/what-hong-kong-must-do-prepare-years-weaker-growth-mainland-china?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 25 Nov 2023 02:00:23 +0000 The Chinese government’s reaction to the country’s persistent youth unemployment highlights a worrying tendency to apply simplistic, moralistic reasoning to complex problems. Editorials in state media encourage young people to “embrace struggle” and sacrifice their youth to the cause of national rejuvenation, as defined by the party. “Eat bitterness,” leaders keep telling youngsters. Policymaking in the mainland has, in recent years, become characterised less by pragmatism, experimentation and... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3232801/chinas-moralising-public-policy-risks-eroding-gains-human-welfare?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3232801/chinas-moralising-public-policy-risks-eroding-gains-human-welfare?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 30 Aug 2023 07:00:10 +0000 The Singapore government this month released a white paper on the city state’s response to Covid-19, highlighting the areas the country did well and where it fell short. The city state scored well in vaccinating the vast majority of the population in just over six months. But it fell short, among other things, in managing the outbreak in migrant worker dormitories, its overly definitive stance against mask-wearing early in the pandemic, and how measures were tightened and eased repeatedly during... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3213952/why-hong-kongs-political-taboos-shouldnt-hinder-independent-pandemic-inquiry?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3213952/why-hong-kongs-political-taboos-shouldnt-hinder-independent-pandemic-inquiry?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 18 Mar 2023 00:00:27 +0000 It has become apparent that mainland China has botched its Covid-19 reopening. After three years of maintaining a strict zero-Covid policy, the surprise at its about-face has been surpassed only by questions as to why such a costly, unsustainable policy was pursued for so long. Economists and historians will spend years trying to find the answers to three mysteries in relation to China’s (mis)handling of the pandemic. First is the question of what the true costs of the zero-Covid policy were,... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3205747/chinas-zero-covid-policy-botched-reopening-will-puzzle-historians-years-come?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3205747/chinas-zero-covid-policy-botched-reopening-will-puzzle-historians-years-come?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 06 Jan 2023 04:00:08 +0000 The sudden reversal of Beijing’s zero-Covid policy, and Hong Kong’s subsequent easing of its own restrictions, highlights not only the futility of zero-Covid but also reveals that the city’s bid to adhere to the mainland’s stance has been a fool’s errand. While many commentators have hailed the Hong Kong government’s recent decision to abolish the 0+3 scheme and drop scanning requirements, it is in fact an indictment of its policy planning and learning capabilities that this latest round of... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3203311/lessons-hong-kong-its-futile-pursuit-chinas-zero-covid-strategy?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3203311/lessons-hong-kong-its-futile-pursuit-chinas-zero-covid-strategy?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 15 Dec 2022 00:30:09 +0000 With mainland China rapidly easing up on its dynamic zero-Covid policy, the critical question confronting Hong Kong now is whether it wants to get ahead of the curve by removing most (if not all) of its remaining Covid restrictions. Failure to do so may well leave Hong Kong as the last jurisdiction in the world in 2023 to still have pandemic restrictions from 2020. There is little doubt that Covid restrictions in Hong Kong have delayed, quite unnecessarily, the economic recovery that should have... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3202432/beijing-eases-zero-covid-can-hong-kong-get-ahead-curve-and-scrap-remaining-rules?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3202432/beijing-eases-zero-covid-can-hong-kong-get-ahead-curve-and-scrap-remaining-rules?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 08 Dec 2022 01:00:16 +0000 The collapse of the decade-long property boom in China – triggered by a government crackdown on overleveraged property developers in early 2021 – has led to a series of defaults by a number of the country’s major developers. More worryingly, the crisis in the property sector has raised wider concerns over the health of banks that have a great deal of exposure to the troubled developers, the fiscal viability of local governments that have become over-reliant on land sales to finance themselves,... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3191159/chinas-property-crisis-grows-can-nationalisation-help-rebalance?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3191159/chinas-property-crisis-grows-can-nationalisation-help-rebalance?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 04 Sep 2022 06:00:23 +0000 In his 2015 memoir, Dealing with China, the former US Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson recalled an admonition from China’s Vice-President Wang Qishan during the global financial crisis: “You were my teacher, but look at your financial system, Hank. We aren’t sure we should be learning from you any more.” Over the last few decades, China has benefited from forging its own path in financial development. China resisted the neoliberal prescriptions of international institutions and the United States,... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3188664/how-chinas-hubris-led-double-debt-crisis-despite-benefits-forging?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3188664/how-chinas-hubris-led-double-debt-crisis-despite-benefits-forging?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 14 Aug 2022 01:00:32 +0000 The Hong Kong government recently cited insufficient mobilisation capacity as the principal reason behind the abandonment of a mass-testing programme for Covid-19. This explanation is half-believable, half-perplexing. On the one hand, administering three Covid-19 tests to every Hong Kong resident in a matter of weeks would have been very costly and required an unprecedented level of coordination and mobilisation of personnel. What to do with positive cases would have been a further issue, as... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3172405/hong-kong-must-rebuild-public-trust-strengthen-its-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3172405/hong-kong-must-rebuild-public-trust-strengthen-its-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 30 Mar 2022 08:44:54 +0000 In the first year of the pandemic – before vaccines were widely available and when levels of natural immunity against Covid-19 were low or nonexistent – strict containment measures aimed at suppressing its spread were not only justified, they were the most prudent course of action. Even if there was little chance of eliminating the virus, the arguments for its strict containment were valid: to protect the health care system from being overburdened, and to buy time for vaccines and/or better... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3170565/hong-kongs-zero-covid-policy-risks-becoming-trap-if-no-lessons?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3170565/hong-kongs-zero-covid-policy-risks-becoming-trap-if-no-lessons?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 15 Mar 2022 11:33:05 +0000 There is little doubt that Hong Kong’s implementation of the “dynamic zero-Covid” strategy – accepting that infections will happen but moving quickly and mobilising all the resources at the state’s disposal to stamp them out – has not worked so far. Since the start of the pandemic, it was known that effective suppression necessitated comprehensive testing, extensive tracing, strict quarantine rules, and quick isolation of confirmed cases – all undertaken over a short period of time to bring... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3167624/3-most-likely-scenarios-how-pandemic-hong-kong-ends?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3167624/3-most-likely-scenarios-how-pandemic-hong-kong-ends?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 18 Feb 2022 13:41:37 +0000 It’s become quite apparent in recent days that Hong Kong’s current social distancing measures are inadequate to suppress the city’s fifth wave of Covid-19. While similar measures were, eventually, effective in ending the fourth wave last spring, the Omicron variant is much more transmissible and cannot be contained as easily. A persistent failure to suppress the current outbreak could leave Hong Kong facing more stringent measures with no end in sight, even as the authorities refuse to... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3165997/omicron-shows-hong-kong-cant-maintain-dynamic-zero-covid-its-time?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3165997/omicron-shows-hong-kong-cant-maintain-dynamic-zero-covid-its-time?utm_source=rss_feed Mon, 07 Feb 2022 00:00:25 +0000 Two recent developments lent credence to the prediction I made in the middle of 2021 that the places which were most successful in suppressing Covid-19 – such as Hong Kong and mainland China – would find it hardest to exit the pandemic. Their early success has increasingly become a winner’s curse and an albatross around the neck that constrains the ability of their governments to respond flexibly to a highly evolved virus – and to an epidemic very different from what it was in 2020. The first... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3164562/can-hong-kong-avoid-dynamic-zero-covid-dystopia-and-be-beijings?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3164562/can-hong-kong-avoid-dynamic-zero-covid-dystopia-and-be-beijings?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 26 Jan 2022 23:30:16 +0000 Since the last quarter of 2021, signs of a sharply decelerating Chinese economy have begun to emerge. This slowdown goes well beyond the property, private education, and internet platform companies that were the targets of intense regulatory action in the last 12 months. In the first year of the pandemic, China’s success in suppressing the spread of Covid-19 provided the impetus for a strong rebound at the start of 2021. The Chinese economy grew by 18.3 per cent on an annualised basis in the... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3163305/tuition-ban-evergrande-collapse-china-tripping-over-its-chase?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3163305/tuition-ban-evergrande-collapse-china-tripping-over-its-chase?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 16 Jan 2022 00:00:11 +0000 When the New Zealand government acknowledged at the start of October that it cannot eliminate Covid-19, that left China (including Hong Kong and Macau) as the only major country still pursuing a zero-Covid strategy. This is not just a public health choice; it is also likely to have long-term economic and geopolitical consequences. There is little doubt that before the arrival of Covid-19 vaccines, the strict suppression approach pioneered by China – and mimicked across East Asia – was highly... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3153262/beijings-insistence-zero-covid-strategy-challenges-long-held?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3153262/beijings-insistence-zero-covid-strategy-challenges-long-held?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 22 Oct 2021 04:30:22 +0000 It is becoming increasingly clear that across the developed world, government responses to Covid-19 have split into two camps. The first camp believes that coexisting with Covid-19 is both inevitable and acceptable. Governments that subscribe to this belief point to the scientific consensus that Covid-19 will become endemic, and conclude that seeking elimination is not only extremely costly but is also doomed to fail unless their societies wish to be hermetically sealed forever. That Covid-19... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3145729/hong-kong-can-break-free-its-zero-covid-corner-heres-how?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3145729/hong-kong-can-break-free-its-zero-covid-corner-heres-how?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 20 Aug 2021 03:44:28 +0000 With the impacts of Covid-19 stretching beyond public health, governments should consult experts other than those in hygienics, epidemiology and microbiology when determining and evaluating their policy responses to the pandemic. Professionals, especially social scientists, would be able to contribute to evidence-based discussions on how combine measures to limit the spread of the virus with efforts to provide economic relief, maintain a semblance of normality for society, and encourage people... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3143228/coronavirus-wont-just-go-away-heres-how-hong-kong-can-learn-live?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3143228/coronavirus-wont-just-go-away-heres-how-hong-kong-can-learn-live?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 01 Aug 2021 03:00:23 +0000 In places that have been successful in suppressing Covid-19, such as mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Singapore, there seems to be a reluctance to accept that the disease will become endemic. The coronavirus variants that are emerging are more transmissible, so to achieve zero or close to zero infections in these places, health authorities say virus control measures must be more stringent than before.  This is neither wise nor tenable for much longer. With highly... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3132638/chasing-zero-covid-19-infections-hong-kong-singapore-australia?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3132638/chasing-zero-covid-19-infections-hong-kong-singapore-australia?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 08 May 2021 02:30:13 +0000 When Hong Kong was recently removed by the Heritage Foundation from its Index of Economic Freedom, Financial Secretary Paul Chan criticised the decision as being motivated by “their ideological inclination and political bias”. But Hong Kong’s policymakers were eager to embrace the Index and its underlying methodology when Hong Kong topped the rankings. The rankings see virtually all forms of government intervention – including taxes and redistribution, government stabilisation policies and... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3125211/hong-kongs-axing-heritage-foundations-economic-freedom-rankings?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3125211/hong-kongs-axing-heritage-foundations-economic-freedom-rankings?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 14 Mar 2021 01:45:09 +0000 Over the last seven days, the average daily number of untraceable cases of Covid-19 in Hong Kong has fallen below five. This should mark the start of efforts to launch the suspended Air Travel Bubble (ATB) between Hong Kong and Singapore, which was originally scheduled to begin on November 22. Meanwhile, there is a growing realisation worldwide that even with the roll-out of highly effective vaccines against Covid-19, we may never reach the level of herd immunity required to eliminate the... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3121932/why-hong-kong-singapore-travel-bubble-key-adapting-new-normal?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3121932/why-hong-kong-singapore-travel-bubble-key-adapting-new-normal?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 17 Feb 2021 00:00:17 +0000 Last Sunday was supposed to mark the start of a quarantine-free air travel bubble between Singapore and Hong Kong, until a rising number of Covid-19 infections in the latter – linked mainly to a still-growing cluster arising from sleazy dance clubs – saw the scheme put on hold for at least two weeks. That such a cluster would emerge in these places is not entirely surprising: videos that have circulated online show their patrons’ quite blatant disregard for personal hygiene and social distancing... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3111498/travel-bubble-what-singapore-and-hong-kongs-contrasting-reactions?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3111498/travel-bubble-what-singapore-and-hong-kongs-contrasting-reactions?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 26 Nov 2020 10:00:13 +0000 Having been holed up in a supposedly dysfunctional and badly governed Hong Kong for almost all of the last three months, it’s been quite surreal for me to observe from afar how the usually high-performing Singapore government has struggled to suppress the spread of SARS-CoV-2, especially in the (now-quarantined) dormitories that house tens of thousands of lowly paid migrant workers. Alongside this public health crisis is an emerging political one: how much blame, if any, should the PAP... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3080095/how-singapore-can-draw-right-lessons-coronavirus-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3080095/how-singapore-can-draw-right-lessons-coronavirus-crisis?utm_source=rss_feed Wed, 15 Apr 2020 23:00:13 +0000 By now, three hard truths about the Covid-19 crisis should have become apparent to policymakers around the world. The first is that every major economy is currently in some form of lockdown, with significant parts of their economies effectively shut down. These lockdowns and shutdowns – the result of what has become known as the suppression strategy – have exacted a huge economic toll. If they are prolonged, they create a high and growing risk of sending the global economy into a... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3078198/coronavirus-has-shown-us-global-economic-system-no-longer-fit?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3078198/coronavirus-has-shown-us-global-economic-system-no-longer-fit?utm_source=rss_feed Fri, 03 Apr 2020 01:00:20 +0000 The daily number of new cases of confirmed Covid-19 infection in China has dropped sharply in the last few weeks – from more than 15,000 on February 12 to just 99 on Friday. Many Chinese provinces and cities have for days, even weeks, reported no daily increase in confirmed infections. There is now clear evidence that the draconian containment measures employed by the Chinese government have worked to curtail the spread of the virus in the world’s most populous country. China’s efforts have been... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3074075/coronavirus-aggressive-containment-most-appropriate-policy?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3074075/coronavirus-aggressive-containment-most-appropriate-policy?utm_source=rss_feed Mon, 09 Mar 2020 00:00:20 +0000 The ongoing novel coronavirus crisis is an opportunity to reflect on how we respond to risk and uncertainty, as well as how governments should communicate risks, in an environment of uncertainty and incomplete and imperfect information. Behavioral scientists have long contended that people often find it very difficult to think in statistical or probabilistic terms, so have highlighted a number of ways in which people’s responses and behaviors depart from what rational choice models... https://www.scmp.com/opinion/how-behavioral-science-can-help-us-fight-coronavirus-outbreak/article/3050041?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/opinion/how-behavioral-science-can-help-us-fight-coronavirus-outbreak/article/3050041?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 11 Feb 2020 11:59:23 +0000 The ongoing novel coronavirus crisis is an opportunity to reflect on how we respond to risk and uncertainty, as well as how governments should communicate risks, in an environment of uncertainty and incomplete and imperfect information. Behavioural scientists have long contended that people often find it very difficult to think in statistical or probabilistic terms, so have highlighted a number of ways in which people’s responses and behaviours depart from what rational choice models... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3049806/why-we-might-have-accept-new-coronavirus-could-be-here-stay?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3049806/why-we-might-have-accept-new-coronavirus-could-be-here-stay?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 11 Feb 2020 00:00:12 +0000 In recent years, the Chinese government has announced a series of measures to open up the financial sector, both to attract foreign investments and to develop its financial system. In November this year, the State Council of China released its “Opinions on Further Improving Work for the Utilisation of Foreign Capital”. The document includes 20 policy measures in four domains – deepening market opening, strengthening investment promotion, extending the reforms in investment facilitation, and... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3042856/china-beware-road-open-economy-paved-asian-casualties?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/3042856/china-beware-road-open-economy-paved-asian-casualties?utm_source=rss_feed Mon, 23 Dec 2019 02:00:06 +0000 “You never let a serious crisis go to waste … It’s an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before.” This was the advice given by Rahm Emanuel, the chief of staff to then US President Barack Obama, at the height of the global financial crisis in 2009. Within nine months of the collapse of the Lehman Brothers investment bank, Obama introduced proposals for a “sweeping overhaul of the United States financial regulatory system, a transformation on a scale not seen since the reforms... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3025153/hong-kong-protests-are-political-crisis-and-huge-opportunity?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3025153/hong-kong-protests-are-political-crisis-and-huge-opportunity?utm_source=rss_feed Sat, 31 Aug 2019 03:45:12 +0000 By the Hong Kong chief executive’s own admission, there were a number of shortcomings in her government’s push for the unpopular extradition bill. She has also committed to learning from these mistakes. The question is whether those shortcomings or mistakes could have been foreseen, and if anything could have been done to prevent them. The last decade has seen an explosion of popular interest in what may be called the “behavioural sciences”, especially cognitive psychology, social psychology,... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3017493/could-psychology-have-helped-carrie-lam-avoid-hong-kongs?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/3017493/could-psychology-have-helped-carrie-lam-avoid-hong-kongs?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 07 Jul 2019 04:45:10 +0000 Hongkongers have long looked at Singapore as a model for how to provide good quality public housing. The latest example was laid out by University of Hong Kong adjunct professor Tony Kwok in his piece for this newspaper, “How would Lee Kuan Yew have solved Hong Kong’s housing and health care problems?” published on April 17. He argued Singapore’s solution had simply been land reclamation, but this is an oversimplification of the city state’s approach to its acute home shortage of the 1960s. The... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/3008807/why-hong-kong-cannot-copy-singapores-approach-public-housing?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/society/article/3008807/why-hong-kong-cannot-copy-singapores-approach-public-housing?utm_source=rss_feed Sun, 05 May 2019 02:32:38 +0000 In recent weeks, the finance ministers of Hong Kong and Singapore delivered their budget statements for the coming financial year. Both statements were notably silent on wealth taxes, an issue that has attracted growing attention in the United States and Europe in the decade since the global financial crisis. Hong Kong and Singapore were very much part of the international consensus in the late 1990s and early 2000s that viewed lower taxes on capital as necessary for attracting wealthy... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2189237/why-hong-kong-and-singapore-should-tax-wealth-more?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2189237/why-hong-kong-and-singapore-should-tax-wealth-more?utm_source=rss_feed Mon, 11 Mar 2019 01:13:46 +0000 The Hong Kong government’s plan to remove e-cigarettes and other novel tobacco products from the market by prohibiting their sale, import and marketing is a regressive step in tobacco control. It is likely to hinder, rather than help, efforts to reduce the smoking rate to 7 per cent by 2025. While it may be psychologically comforting to think a hardline stance on e-cigarettes will reduce the harm done by smoking, the opposite is probably true. Why so? First, there is growing consensus in the... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2186676/why-hong-kong-should-accept-e-cigarettes-if-it-wants-smoke-free?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/opinion/article/2186676/why-hong-kong-should-accept-e-cigarettes-if-it-wants-smoke-free?utm_source=rss_feed Tue, 19 Feb 2019 01:04:05 +0000 This year marks the 200th anniversary of the founding of modern Singapore by Sir Stamford Raffles, an occasion the city state plans to mark with a year-long series of activities. Yet officials have been careful as to how they describe proceedings. Lest they be accused of “celebrating” colonialism, they are calling the events a “commemoration”, and have called on Singaporeans to re-examine their views of the legacy of the British in Singapore. On some levels, this attitude seems a little strange.... https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2184501/200-years-raffles-singapore-can-embrace-another-british-idea?utm_source=rss_feed https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/politics/article/2184501/200-years-raffles-singapore-can-embrace-another-british-idea?utm_source=rss_feed Thu, 31 Jan 2019 09:45:00 +0000