>The aim wasn’t just to make the city more pleasant. A cleaner city, Lee Kuan Yew reasoned, would create a stronger economy. >“These standards will keep morale

>The aim wasn’t just to make the city more pleasant. A cleaner city, Lee Kuan Yew reasoned, would create a stronger economy. >“These standards will keep morale high, sickness rate low, and so create the necessary social conditions for higher economic growth in industry and in tourism. [...]" It's interesting that Singapore has, with this policy, become one of the very few unambiguously successful, unambiguously tropical countries. HK/Macao qualify, but historically had more support from their suzerains. Otherwise you've got, like, maybe Mauritius and Barbados. The desert oil nations would qualify, but their dryness prevents disease.