Salary.sg – Your Salary in Singapore

We don’t invest all our cash. Most of us keep some cash in a savings account, whether to pay bills or to invest when the opportunity comes.

So which bank in Singapore gives us the highest interest rate for a savings account?

We are not talking about money market funds or time deposits (aka fixed deposits). We are talking about the traditional savings deposit account.

The highest interest rate I’ve seen in recent times used to be from Standard Chartered Bank CDA Account. Strictly speaking, this is also not a traditional savings account, but if you are a parent, it’s almost equivalent. See our previous article on Baby Bonus CDA Account.

However, the Stanchart CDA has been paying an interest of only 0.5% since November last year. It used to give out 1.0% previously.

More recently, many banks have advertised seemingly attractive rates for their savings accounts.

For example, Stanchart e$aver promises “up to” 0.9%, but when you read the fine print, it’s valid only during the “promotional period” till 31 March 2012. What happens thereafter is anyone’s guess. In my opinion, the rate is very likely to go down. Stanchart, please prove me wrong.

On the other hand, CIMB StarSaver pays a 0.8% interest on a more palatable condition (to me) – you just have to make regular monthly deposits of at least $500. And CIMB, in my opinion, has been more consistent with its relatively high interest rates (it previously paid 0.9% a year ago) and it’s less gimmicky in its advertising. The only downside is perhaps the fact that CIMB has only 2 branches in Singapore.

Recommendation

If there’s no other bank more generous in their interest payments, Salary.sg recommends this strategy if you have $200k or more: Use Stanchart e$saver until 31 March, and then move your money to CIMB StarSaver.

PM Lee will get a 36% salary cut and receive an annual pay of $2.2m without pension, down from the previous pay package of $3.07m + pension. This is the recommendation given in the Committee to Review Ministerial Salaries Report. The ministerial pay review took more than 7 months to complete.

PM Lee’s new base monthly salary will be $110,000, which is what President Tony Tan will receive monthly as well.

But President Tan will only get 14 months total per year (12 months base + 13th month bonus + Annual Variable Component), without any Performance Bonus or National Bonus. This gives a total of $1.54m for President Tan.

The annual salary for ministers will use this formula: Fixed pay (13 months) + up to 1.5 months AVC + up to 6 months’ PB + up to 6 months’ National Bonus.

A junior minister at the MR4 grade will get a minimum of $715k and a maximum of $1.46m in a year. His “reference” monthly salary will be $55k.

As the top political appointee, PM Lee will not get any individual Performance Bonus, but in lieu of that, he will be paid a larger National Bonus.

The National Bonus will be derived based on 4 indicators: real median income growth rate, real growth rate of the lowest quintile income, unemployment rate and real GDP growth rate.

The report also mentions MSO medical benefits and a car benefit (only for the President), but these are absolutely insignificant in relation to the huge pay packages. For example, what they get from MSO in a year ($1,190) is even less than what they earn in a day from their base pay!

The archaic pension scheme will also be discontinued.

Members of Parliament, most of whom hold full-time jobs elsewhere, will get their part-time allowance of $192,500 a year. This is $16,041 a month for a part-time appointment, already more than what many graduate couples can ever earn working full-time.

Make-Up Pay

There’s an interesting paragraph in the report (¶90) on matching a new minister’s previous salaries:

“… propose retaining the current make-up pay system which was introduced in Parliament in 1989 but has not been used so far. Under this system, the Prime Minister can offer a candidate make-up pay for up to 90% of the difference between the pay of the appointment and the candidate’s average pay in the last three years prior to the appointment. However, we propose that this be for up to one term in office only, as compared to the current provision of up to two terms. After this, the person will be paid according to his salary grade.” (boldface mine)

This means that if someone of Ng Eng Hen’s calibre comes along, gets voted in (possibly as member of a GRC) and appointed by PM as a new minister, he can continue to earn close to his last-drawn salary for about 5 to 6 years in his first term in political office. Ng Eng Hen once said he earned 5 times more in the private sector (Channelnewsasia, 9 September 2003).

This make-up pay makes it easier for someone to consider political office, certainly easier than what Grace Fu made it out to be. She said in her facebook:

“I had some ground to believe that my family would not suffer a drastic change in the standard of living even though I experienced a drop in my income. So it is with this recent pay cut. If the balance is tilted further in the future, it will make it harder for any one considering political office.” (boldface mine)

Let’s not forget that as a junior minister in Singapore, Grace Fu is already earning – even after her pay cut – about twice the salary of Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Donald Tsang. And Tsang was ranked the world’s 2nd highest paid politician by MSN Money. Alas, they forgot to include our junior ministers in their ranking. How careless of them!

MND and IRAS have just announced an Additional Buyer’s Stamp Duty (ABSD) for all private properties – including condominiums, private apartments and landed property – bought from 8 Dec 2011.

This ABSD is levied “over and above” the existing Buyer’s Stamp Duty.

For foreigners and corporate entities, the ABSD is 10% of the property price or market value, whichever is higher.

For example, if a non-PR Chinese national from mainland China buys a condo for $1 million, he will have to pay $100k for ABSD and $24.6k for the existing Buyer’s Stamp Duty. This means IRAS will collect a total of $124.6k in taxes from him.

Citizens and PRs are somewhat luckier.

PRs buying their 2nd and subsequent private property will pay a lower 3% ABSD.

Citizens will also pay a 3% ABSD, but only for their 3rd and subsequent property.

If you are buying a private property, use our ABSD calculator below to get an idea of how much stamp duty you have to pay. Just enter the property purchase price or market valuation (whichever is higher).

MOF sent out a press release to remind all Singaporeans aged 21 and above to sign up to receive their 2011 Growth Dividend, if they have not already done so. Besides the Growth Dividend, citizens aged 45 and above will also receive their CPF Medisave Top-up. The easiest way to sign up is to do [...]

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The HDB Income Ceiling will be raised to $10,000 for BTO flats and $12,000 for ECs (executive condominiums). [Update 15th Aug 2011: The revised HDB income ceiling will take effect today, 15th Aug 2011. Source: Straits Times.] Previously, the respective ceilings were $8,000 and $10,000. This was just announced by PM Lee Hsien Loong in [...]

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