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Recently, I happened to see a picture about this index in The Economist website.
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A UBS report published recently offers a handy guide to how long it takes a worker on the average net wage to earn the price of a Big Mac in 73 cities. This picture is used to guage the purchasing power of a worker in these cities.
Singapore falls near to the global average. We take around 38 minutes of work to buy a big Mac. A big Mac in Singapore cost around S$3.95. If we pro-rate to 60 minutes, it means our average wage is around S$6.24/hr.
For those working in Jakarta, they need nearly 1hr 20 minutes of work to earn a big mac. I remembered a trip to Jakarta nearly 10 years ago where I had a meal in MacDonalds. I remembered vividly that there were quite a number of children standing outside the resturant. When we finished our meal and walked out, these children ran into the resturant to see if we left behind any fries or burgers. I think, to them, eating in MacDonalds must be such a luxury.
For the same big mac, the American in Chicago only need to work 15 minutes. This really illustrates the strong purchasing power of the Americans. If the US economy do not turn round fast, who shall buy our Asian manufactured goods? Many Americans are still jobless, don't be overly excited with the economy yet. It will be a long way before we see normal growth in these developed economies.
1 comment:
So the average Singaporean takes 38 minutes of work to buy a Big Mac. Can you work out how many Big Macs our PM, MM or President can buy for reading newspaper or doing physiotherapy for 38 minutes? Should be quite enough to feed all the old ladies in Singapore for a long time while dragging the cardboard boxes to the nearest collection centre.
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