Dream salary & perks, Govt job in HK is a dream come true

The salary difference between the Chief Secretary and the Chief Executive (equivalent to the Governor under the British) is barely HK $ 20,000 a month.Only the Chairman of the Monetary Authority, similar to the Reserve Bank of India chief, gets a much higher salary: about Rs 30 lakh a month.

Such salary levels ensure that civil servants are not quietly doing the bidding of even institutions like the World Bank in the hope of getting a job when they retire. They also keep other forms of corruption well under check.

Even police constables start around Rs 50,000 a month, housing and most other expenses met. An inspector’s salary will be three times that much.

Under these circumstances, no eyebrows were raised when Governor Chris Patten received an end-of-service gratuity of about Rs 1.5 crore, tax-free.

For Patten, that’s just the start of a bonanza. He is going to host a television series on Asia, which could fetch him about Rs 6 crore. By way of icing on the cake, he may make another Rs 10 lakh from the book he is writing.

Not bad for a Governor who twisted the tail of the Chinese dragon and is now poised to become the next Conservative Prime Minister of Britain.Government salaries in Hong Kong tend to be a notch higher than ordinary salaries in the private sector. An ordinary English language journalist is unlikely to be making as much as a police inspector. A teacher may start a little above a constable and then rise to about Rs 2.5 lakh a month.

At the upper end, a highly-qualified medical consultant may draw a salary of Rs 7 lakh a month, which is no higher than a senior civil servant’s.

The other side of these gilt-edged salaries is that living costs are also just as high. An Indian banker, who recently retired, lives in a flat (comfortable, not luxurious) for which he pays a rent of about Rs 3 lakh a month. He can afford it, but if the next rent revision takes it to still higher levels, he says he will have to think of moving out of Hong Kong.

Only in a downmarket locality can you get a flat for less than Rs 1 lakh a month. If you live in the verdantly suburban Discovery Bay, about 25 minutes from the Central business district, one to-and-fro ferry ticket will cost you Rs 250. Most bus rides cost Rs 25, while flag-fall for a taxi is about Rs 65.

Are the high salaries available in Hong Kong worth it? Yes, if you are in a job that provides free housing and some other essential perks. For others, the answer cannot be very encouraging.

One Indian consultant recently moved to Manila, where he makes half the money he used to make in Hong Kong.

“That half income,” he said, “takes me longer in the Philippines than the full income took me in Hong Kong.”