Position paper 1: On car prices (UPDATED with Chinese Translation)

ARCHIVES 2013

By MT Webmaster On Apr 13, 2013

The local councils should operate free shuttles from your homes to the train and bus stations, as well as within the city — where you can get from one place to another free by just jumping onto the shuttle. And there should be only five-minute intervals between shuttles at peak time and ten or 15 minutes off-peak.

THE CORRIDORS OF POWER

Raja Petra Kamarudin

On the one hand, while I agree that car prices in Malaysia are ridiculously expensive, on the other hand I do not agree that cars should be cheap in Malaysia.

I know this sounds contradictory so allow me to explain what I mean.

In the UK, I can buy a brand new BMW that will cost roughly ONE year of my gross salary — assuming I am earning £22,000-24,000 a year, say, as a chef in a restaurant.

In Malaysia, doing that same job, the same BMW would cost me about twelve years of my salary. That means in, Malaysia, it costs 12 times what it costs in the UK.

So I do not convert the Pound to the Ringgit and worry about the actual cost of the car in Ringgit. I compare my earning capacity to the number of years it would cost to own that car based on that earning level.

Cars should cost about one to two years of your earning capacity and houses about ten years. That would mean you have quality of life.

Now, while cars should be affordable to own, they should be heavily taxed when you drive them. Currently, they are heavily taxed even if you don’t use them and they sit idle in your garage or driveway.

Hence we should implement congestion zones where you pay heavily to drive in these congestion zones but not when you drive on the highways and country roads. And you also pay heavy parking fees when you park in the cities and towns.

Hence, also, cars would be cheap to own but expensive to operate. And the more you drive and park, the more you pay. So it is better you ‘abandon’ your car and use public transport to get where you want to get to.

We must also be very careful about reducing car prices overnight. If you have just spent RM120,000 to buy a new car, you would not want that same car being sold for RM80,000 the following year. That means your RM120,000 car would suddenly become RM50,000 in value. You would expect your (second-hand) car value to be at least RM80,000 but how can it be RM80,000 when you can now buy a brand new one for that same price?

Pakatan Rakyat has made promises about reducing car prices without looking at the implications of that move. Firstly, many Malaysians would see their asset value depreciating drastically. Secondly, we will see many more cars on the road. What we want to see is lesser cars on the road, not more cars. The traffic jams and pollution in Malaysia is so bad that we should discourage rather than encourage Malaysians to drive.

Of course, for all this to happen, we need a more efficient public transport system. And herein lies the problem — Malaysia’s public transport system sucks.

And am I glad I will not be in the government that needs to worry about all this.

Anyway, the local councils and town planners need to look into this. And this is why we need local council elections. Then we can kick out those councillors who are not doing their job. Currently, local council positions are used as a reward for loyal party supporters.

And herein lies the other problem — our local councils suck.

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立場表明文（一）：論車价

地方政府（即市政府）應該提供免費的公交，讓你免費地往來你的住家和公交站。而儅你要到市内的任何一個地方時，你也應該可以乘搭免費的公交到達目的地。再者，繁忙時段的公交等候時間最長應該只是5分鐘，非繁忙時段則10-15分鐘。

原文：Raja Petra Kamarudin
譯文：方宙

一方面我認同馬來西亞車价貴的離譜，但另一方面我不贊同大馬應該把車价降低。

我知道這聼起來很矛盾，所以請讓我進一步解釋。

假設我在英國是一名廚師，那一輛剷新寳馬的價格大約是我一年的薪水，即22千-24千英鎊。

但在馬來西亞，如果我做的是同樣的職業，我則需要用我12年的薪水來購買同一輛寳馬。換句話說，大馬的寳馬比英國的貴了12倍。

在這邊我講的並不是那輛寳馬真正的馬幣價格，我對比是在這兩個不同的國家裏我應該用多少年的年薪來購買同一輛車。

一般上，想要擁有好的生活質量，你的車子應該是你年薪的1-2倍，你的房子則應該是大約10倍。

現在，雖然說車子應該是負擔得起的，但在你駕駛時你應該被抽重稅。但是在馬來西亞即時你只是買了車子而沒有經常駕駛，你還是被抽了重稅。

我們應該規劃出該付費的繁忙地段；而儅你駕在高速公路或鄉間馬路時你則不必付費。同樣的，如果你在市内泊車時你也應該付較貴的泊車費。

所以說，買車應該是便宜的，但用車則應該是昂貴的。儅你駕得更多時你也要付得更多，所以你自然而然地就會‘放棄’你的車子而應用公交系統。

儅我們談及降低車价時我們得格外小心。如果你剛花12万購買一輛新車的話，你不會想看到同一輛車在明年就以8万售出；那將會代表你那12万的車明年只值5万。你當初預算在1年后你那12万的車會值8万，但現在新車都已經是8万了，你的（二手）車賣8万還會有人買嗎？

民聯當初作出承諾時根本就沒想清楚後果。其一，很多人將會看到他們的資產一夜間貶值。其二，我們會看到很多車子在馬路上奔跑。我們真正需要的是較少的車子而不是更多的車子。馬來西亞的塞車與污染程度已經很糟糕了，我們不應該再鼓勵人們駕車。

當然，我們必須首先擁有一個有效的公交系統。而這正是問題的癥結—-我國的公交系統真他媽的沒用。

而我真的很慶幸我沒有為政府工作，因爲我不必爲上述的事情操心。

無論如何，地方政府與城市策劃應該認真地看待這個問題。這就是爲什麽我們要舉行地方選舉的原因：我們可以把沒做工的的市議員們踢出局。如今，市政侷的崗位只是執政黨用來安頓他們自己黨員的而已。

而這正是問題的另一個癥結—-我們的地方政府/市政府真他媽的窩囊。