How do you measure your worth?

A few months back, the Singapore government released a civil service pay revision that pegged ministerial salaries to the top earners in 6 private sector professions, resulting in salary rises of between 14-33%.

My father-in-law recently forwarded a link to NMP Thio Li-Ann's (an NUS Law Prof) cogent argument "whether the wrong message is being sent to ... the post 1965 generation in conceptualizing reward and structuring incentive in primarily monetary terms." If you've time and interest, do read her full speech linked here.

In conveying an overwhelming market-oriented ethos, are we not discounting intangible values which are essential for nation-building? The underlying ideology of profit maximization which can breed a fixation on self-interest stands at odds with attributes of selflessness and dedication to the common good.

.... We are not merely atomistic, profit-maximising individuals, evaluating opportunity costs and benefits; the call to service is a noble one.... There is more to life than seeing things through the dominant lens of money and human resource management. Virtues like loyalty, sacrifice, perseverance, sustain hope that a nation will endure and become great. It is a privilege to be able to build something of enduring worth in our lifetime. Greatness is not measured in purely monetary terms; otherwise, we would celebrate mercenaries, not patriots.

The market is a marvelous motivator, but it can lead to insularity, selfishness and the "I come first" mentality. My concern is that if we conceptualise the worth of our government leaders in predominantly material or monetary terms, an over-emphasis on Market values may send the wrong message to my generation. After all, the worth of a person does not turn on how much he earns.

One's sense of duty must perhaps co-exist with other motives; but where does prudence end and avarice begin? When does the impulse to reward someone for a job well-done cross the line and descend into the realm of greed? I appreciate the need to pay ministers well, but in devising an appropriate formula, there is a need to be vigilant, in the light of public unhappiness, to strike a median between austerity and excessive prosperity.

We must take care and be conscious of the message being sent to Singaporeans through this revision exercise, as the underlying assumptions speak of how we value things. Do we value people instrumentally, primarily through what can be quantified? Or do we appreciate the intrinsic worth of things, which is essential to any society which cherishes the principle of human dignity and authentic community.