FEBRUARY 28 ― I think we should do away with the current economic benchmarks and just have a KFC snack plate index.
KFC used to be the basic middle-class affordability yardstick; no matter how depressing it can get for the middle-income set, KFC was always at least attainable even if for some it was a monthly treat.
Now I look at KFC prices and think: if I'm going to spend that much on chicken I'll have it elsewhere thanks.
Looking at current KFC delivery prices, it's RM18.99 for a snack plate without a drink and an extra RM2 to add a beverage.
Considering how KFC chicken sizes have shrunk it's hard to justify the value especially when now there are so many fast food chicken options.
I feel as though from March onwards I will be forced into frugality against my will as like the GST, the government raising the sales and service tax is going to see snowballing in prices.
Am really tired of explaining to people that a rise in taxes will have a compounding effect; you won't see only a one per cent increase across the board.
Take for instance, hotels. Malaysian hotels are now raising room prices but that's probably not all that's going to be more expensive.
Expect to pay more for room service, for eating at hotel eateries and to see previously free services charged.
I've already noticed that at even some of the fancier hotels, amenities I would take for granted are no longer available.
I now rarely find bathrobes, and sometimes not even free hotel slippers.
With how hotels are cost cutting, Airbnbs and homestays are probably going to regain the customers they lost to hotels in the last couple of years.
That's if they don't also raise their prices.
I still believe that former prime minister's shoddy implementation of GST was partly the reason why his administration lost the general election.
Hopefully by next week I will find something else to write about but with someone rightfully pointing out it's still cheaper to eat out in Hatyai than in most places in Malaysia, I fear I won't be the only one left irritated by prices always going up, while never going down.
Why are Malaysians always told to just “accept” that rates will go up for public transport, for tolls, for utilities because it's just the natural way of things.
Yet we have unnaturally depressed wages for decades. How much longer do we need to put up with governments treating employers with kid gloves.
I hoped that with a new administration, we would find new ways to do things. We would finally start taking at least baby steps towards the insidious endemic of corruption; that maybe politicians would stop using race rhetoric to garner support and there would be punishment for those who still do so.
Instead, it feels as though we are getting a similar government to past ones except maybe painted over with a new slogan.
Stop it with the slogans and catchphrases already.
Speaking of catchphrases, I find it thoroughly odd that we are now making politicians recite the Rukun Negara like we made schoolchildren do at school assemblies.
We love show and lip service but we do not push harder for actual action, and that I think is the biggest problem in Malaysia.
There are, as I keep telling people, no proper channels. It is a myth made up by politicians to stop us from bothering them.
It's distressing that the one avenue that should have been open to us — public demonstrations — is now so policed to the point I could stand in a corner with a sign and my cat, and technically be participating in an illegal demonstration.
What has Madani delivered besides pithy speeches, big words (government speechwriters, please burn your thesauruses and use plain language) and walking back on decades-old election promises?
All I have supposedly benefited from is slightly lower income tax deductions but instead I will have to pay more for everything else, from food to service taxes and now, utilities.
Malaysians have always deserved better than what we have got before, and even more now.
Convince me, and the voters that the M in Madani doesn't stand for “monied people get all the perks” because otherwise we have nothing more to look forward to besides steamrolling inflation, increased income gaps and the same thing all over again.
* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
