(b)
3 -
Certain
Colonics and, as was to be expected, in conse- quence of the close liaison maintained between the Hong Kong Salaries Commission and the Trusted Commission in Malaya, we found that the effect of the recommendations of the two Commissions in this connection was substantially the same minor discrepancies were found to be offset by dis- crepancies in an opposite direction. To all intents and purposes, therefore, it may be accepted that the revised basic rates of salary in the two Colonies are the same.
Approximate equality in the cost of living in
Hong Kong and in Singapore.
(i) Comparison of the cost of living in two Colonics is no easy task. Ja tas instance, however, the main difficulty (differences in patterns of expenditure) is dininished to some extent by reason of the fact that as for as expatriate Officers are concerned expenditure proferences though liabilities may differ to some extent as a result of differences in climate (that of Hong Kong necessitates provision for warm clothing as well os for sumer clothing) and terrain (dis- tances travelled to and from work in Singapore are probably greater). In respect of the local staff in the two Colonies, again the difficulty is diminished in so far as Chinese preferences are concerned. In regard to liabilities, al- though the evidence available is not, by any means, conclusive, we are inclined to the view that housing conditions are worse in Hong Kong, and that the outlay upon rent is therefore greater.
(ii) It was impossible, in the time and with the information available, to make a thorough com parative study, and we accordingly confined our attention to a comparison of food prices, since expenditure upon food is by far the most important essential item in the budgets whether of expatriate or local staff. (As far as the latter are concerned in Hong Kong expenditure on food was found in the family living study upon which the mathematical "weights" for the Retail Price Index Figure word based to amount to more than 50% of total family expenditure).
(iii) Reference is invited to ppendix C of this Report in which the prices in June and July 1948 of the most important food-stuffs in the two Colonics are compared. The "dollar for dollar" argument in this connection, which was advanced in pre-war days, is evidently no longer sound.
(iv) The most important feature of this comparison, when the patterns of expenditure of local staff are taken into consideration, is the equivalence of the price of rationed rice, since that is the staple food of the Chinese in both Colonies. And the fact that the chief farinaceous substitutes therefor are not only scarcer but more expensive in Hong Kong than in Singaporu more than offsets any difference in the amount of the ration in the opposite direction.
(v) A further important point in the comparison in the cost of living of Officers in the two Colonies is the fact that the liabilitics of the expatriato
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