How can Singapore's leading newspaper make elementary mistakes in economics? It goofed up on the very first day of the year in its report on the Prime Minister's New Year message.
In a sidebar on the front page, it reported:
Quarter on quarter, the Singapore economy grew by 3.5 per cent from October to December, according to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong in his New Year message for 2010.
Quarter on quarter, the Singapore did not grow by 3.5 per cent from October to December. On the contrary, it shrank 6.8 per cent, as the government announced today.
So where did the Straits Times get that figure from?
This is what the Prime Minister said in his New Year message:
Our fourth quarter growth is 3.5%, although for the whole year our growth is still negative, at -2.1%.
By that, he meant the economy had grown 3.5 per cent in the fourth quarter compared with the same period the previous year.
But the Straits Times took it to mean the economy had grown 3.5 per cent since the previous quarter.
Comparing it with previous quarters, it said:
This is markedly lower than the 14.2 per cent achieved between July and September, and the 21.7 per cent between April and June.
Those are quarterly growth figures. The economy grew by more than 21 per cent in the second quarter compared with the first quarter, and by more than 14 per cent in the third quarter compared with the second.
The Ministry of Trade and Industry spelt it out clearly today. It said:
On a seasonally adjusted quarter-on-quarter annualised basis, Singapore’s GDP contracted by 6.8 per cent in the fourth quarter due to a pull-back in the manufacturing sector. Compared to the fourth quarter of 2008, the economy grew by 3.5 per cent.
Channel NewsAsia got it right. Reporting the Prime Minister's New Year message, it said:
Singapore achieved 3.5 per cent growth in the fourth quarter of 2009 — after negative growth in the first and second quarters, and 0.6 per cent growth in the third quarter.
Maybe the Straits Times has already published a correction, but I don't it see every day. I discovered the mistake only today after the government announced the economy had shrunk 6.8 per cent since the previous quarter.
Related posts:
- Singapore GDP down 6.8% quarter on quarter, manufacturing down 38.4%: Worst performance since 1st quarter
- Straits Times cherrypicks economic survey findings
- Happy New Year in Singapore’s flagging economy
- Singapore growth driven by biomedicals, construction, business services
- Singapore GDP up, but almost all other indicators down
Don’t be so surprised – those guys can even mix up millions and billions…
I highlighted an article to them once about how they got our reserves wrong at XX million when it should have been in the billions…
The guy who took my call didn’t know the difference and couldn’t care less…
the worrying thing is that the low base effects of the past two qoq data are subsiding, hence the 4th quarter qoq growth is showing a decline. It will be interesting whether the qoq growth for first quarter of 2010, irregardless of the yoy figures.
Coupled that with the huge 38% decline in manufacturing sector, i wonder unemployment rate will shot up further. Shouldn’t 4th quarter numbers bring strong result due to the year-end consumer effect?
I think the fourth quarter is usually good for the retail business because of the Christmas season, but the third quarter should normally be better for manufacturing because the orders have to be met before the Christmas season. But I don’t have any figures to back me up. I am just going by the fact that new gadgets and technology are usually introduced before Christmas. Windows 7, Windows XP, the iPod were all launched in October, Kindle in November. But all those are consumer products. It may be different for biomedicals, petrochemicals and other industries.