sorry, but what??

Article saying that Singaporeans have too much bargaining power in the employment game and this is decreasing the amount of lateral thinking and creativity at work.

Right, this is about a country that 1) doesn't really have an unemployment insurance schemes, 2) has lack of unions , 3) no minimum wage law and that expects families to act as a form of partial insurance against such shocks.

I can't see how the author's argument really works. For one thing, it seems to me that the gripe is about the higher reservation wages Singaporeans have. This means that for a firm to attract and retain the best talent, the firm would be required to offer better pay packages, and/or challenges/work balances that provide job fulfillment to the employee. If we think that there exists a distribution of firms of varying productivity and competitiveness, this should suggest that only more productive firms are able to stay in the market and offer the more attractive pay/work packages to Singaporeans. This in turn, points that there is a selection effect in the market. we are reallocating labourers to the best firms and the worst firms in the market die out because they can't afford to stay in and pay the going reservation wage.

One of the things that contributes to productivity growth comes from the extensive margins of firms, i.e. the entry and exit effect of firms. Productivity grows when labour is re-allocated to the best industries and when the most inefficient exits the markets. Such re-allocation of labour contributes to overall GDP growth. I'm not convinced that we should be upset about Singaporeans having more bargaining power in this case, since it does produce a selection effect on firms. So if Singaporeans are quitting and moving to better firms, I'm for it.

What about if the argument was about the threat of being fired having less and less of a penalty effect because Singaporeans are easily covered by family insurance (moving back in or staying with parents) ?

Again, I think this argument doesn't work because job displacement via being laid off or being fired is a black mark against the employee. Its a negative signal that he sends the next employer since the act of being fired says something the employee's own ability or attitude. Also, there should be some distinction between a worker who searches for new employers while on the job, versus a worker who searches after he has been laid off. The spell and length of unemployment may act as an indicator to the next employer about the employee's ability, suggesting that all these negative signals give rise to more labour market risk for the respective worker.

Finally, we come to the author using the following as evidence of Singaporeans having too much bargaining power:

A recent survey showed that 40% of Singaporean’s would change job this year. They will because they know that they can. From an employer point of view this attitude limits creativity, lateral thinking and drive which in turn limit a company’s ability to compete. It’s one of the reasons that one million foreigners have been employed in Singapore in the past decade and its one of the reasons that holds back Singapore from realizing the amazing potential that the country has.

Why would we expect that coming out of a recession and in the midst of a very sharp recovery, that people would not switch jobs? In 2008 when the recession hit, we would expect that people who had previously wanted to switch jobs, would have stayed on in their jobs longer for fear of not being able to secure another one. We would also expect that during a recession, people who were looking for jobs may have taken on jobs that were not their first choice because of limited selection of jobs on the market during a recession. Given these trends, it should be expected that people would then want to switch jobs when the economy is rising fast out of a recession and when better job offerings are available on the market.

I agree that too much bargaining power on the worker's side can limit performance. But I have trouble believing this for Singapore. Mostly because we have so few unions and lack of unemployment insurance. (And also because we are notorious for working people over time and making them come back on weekends)

Job switching shouldn't necessarily be discouraged. The average person in the US changes occupation about 7 times in his employment history. Most of these jobs are concentrated in the early part of one's career, suggesting that the employer and worker are learning about their match quality; and that the worker may be learning about his comparative advantage and fit to certain kinds of jobs.

Besides, what are we trying to be? Wisconsin????