Government determined to increase population to 7 mil in 2030.

(06-02-2013, 09:18 PM)Musicwhiz Wrote:

(06-02-2013, 09:02 PM)d.o.g. Wrote: I vote Inderjit Singh for Home Affairs Minister!

Call me cynical, but I even went so far as to suspect that the PAP may have "planted" certain people to say certain things, all in the name of a "healthy debate".

Or perhaps I am simply too cynical after living on this little red dot for so long!

Its called the Good cop & Bad cop syndrome.
In any case, even if Mr Indergit Singh really reject the White Paper with his vote with some minority PAP MPs, it doesn't matter as its 81 vs 7 in Parliament.
The ruling party can sustain a 1/4 of their MPs within rank opposing the White Paper (AND the 7 WP MPs) and still get it approved.

That the reality within.
We, the commoners, just have to keep trying and keep helping to raise the voices of one another and lower society strata level who may not even be able to voice their grievances legibly through internet medium.

(06-02-2013, 09:18 PM)Musicwhiz Wrote:

(06-02-2013, 09:02 PM)d.o.g. Wrote: I vote Inderjit Singh for Home Affairs Minister!

Call me cynical, but I even went so far as to suspect that the PAP may have "planted" certain people to say certain things, all in the name of a "healthy debate".

Or perhaps I am simply too cynical after living on this little red dot for so long!

Must wayang ma, otherwise not democratic society.

Lee Yi-Shyan and Mah Bow Tan..
These two belongs to survive at all cost camp.(mostly at the cost of low income singaporeans)
Quoted examples from Japan. But, he did not mention that the japanese are not complaining about aging population.

Quote:Silver tsunami & dwindling workforce can destabilise economies: Lee Yi Shyan
By Imelda Saad | Posted: 06 February 2013 2136 hrs

SINGAPORE: Senior Minister of State for National Development and Trade & Industry Lee Yi-Shyan has painted a sobering picture of an ageing population and shrinking workforce.

Speaking in Parliament on the Population White Paper and Land Use Plan on Wednesday, Mr Lee pointed to the experience of Asian neighbours like Japan and Taiwan as examples of how the silver tsunami and dwindling workforce can destabilise economies.

For example, a city outside Nagoya called Gifu has seen shops along the main street closed for good.

In Hokkaido, in a small town called Yubari, half of the population is above 65 years old.

Mr Lee said Yubari's small working population means a measly tax base.

Four years ago, the city government went bust after owing a debt of US$315 million. The city was later forced to embark on an 18-year austerity drive.

Mr Lee said: "It retrenched half of its civil servants. Public service in the City was badly affected. The public library was gone. Six primary schools merged into one. The General Hospital closed down two thirds of its facilities to save utilities. It also halved its number of ambulances and asked its elderly patients to walk to the hospital by themselves."

The effect of two decades of economic stagnation in Japan, said Mr Lee has led to what is described as "the Waniguchi (crocodile's mouth) effect" - Soaring public expenditure coupled with a drop in tax revenue.

Mr Lee said the huge silver tsunami is destabilising Japan.

He said the country did not manage to raise its working population because it could not build a consensus to allow immigration to boost the workforce.

Similarly in Taiwan, Mr Lee pointed to an article which described the economy as "a small tax revenue country but large welfare state."

Mr Lee said Singapore is not operating in silos.

The world, he said, will continue to move forward, regardless of Singapore's demographic and internal problems.

It is against this larger picture, he said, that Singapore has to define its path forward.

Mr Lee said: "It makes sense for the nation to maintain a sustainable and stable Singaporean population while we are still young, and while external conditions are favourable."

Mr Lee noted there are lessons to be learnt from the experiences of other countries.

The number of elderly citizens in Singapore aged 65 and above will increase considerably from around 340,000 in 2011 to 900,000 by 2030.

Mr Lee cited China's rapidly ageing population to highlight issues which Singapore may face in the future.

He said: "China is beginning to see the "4-2-1" phenomenon: one child having to look after two parents and four grandparents. This inverted pyramid means a heavy burden for the children. When both parents and grandparents are retired, there is also the "aged caring for the aged" phenomenon and this is becoming common in our communities."

Echoing the sentiment, former Cabinet Minister Mah Bow Tan said Singapore cannot afford to lose its edge and become less competitive.

He urged Singaporeans to keep their hearts and minds open.

Mr Mah said: "We have spent a lot of our time looking inwards, talking about our discomforts, our space. We have not asked ourselves how we are going to compete with outside world. How we are going to earn a living to live the good life. It is almost taken from granted that the good life will continue even if growth slows. We expect new infrastructure to be rolled out, even as growth slows. We want more subsidies for health care and housing and let's have less foreign workers and a slower pace of life. Where will the revenue from all this come from?"

Mr Mah, who is MP for Tampines GRC, said government revenue comes mostly from income taxes, consumption taxes and asset taxes, all of which are dependent on economic growth.

He added Singapore needs a bigger population with better educated and trained citizens as well as talented non-residents to supplement the home-grown talent.

Mah BT has no right to speak about anything. He is a complete failure in planning and forecasting. Affordable and enough flats for all. After KBW took over his role, KBW kept building till non stop.

Mah should be placed in private sector as he has a good business mind. COE and BTO were both his idea.

Japanese took steps by research into building robots to replace insufficient workforce.

(06-02-2013, 09:52 PM)yeokiwi Wrote: Lee Yi-Shyan and Mah Bow Tan..
These two belongs to survive at all cost camp.(mostly at the cost of low income singaporeans)
Quoted examples from Japan. But, he did not mention that the japanese are not complaining about aging population.

Quote:Silver tsunami & dwindling workforce can destabilise economies: Lee Yi Shyan
By Imelda Saad | Posted: 06 February 2013 2136 hrs

SINGAPORE: Senior Minister of State for National Development and Trade & Industry Lee Yi-Shyan has painted a sobering picture of an ageing population and shrinking workforce.

Speaking in Parliament on the Population White Paper and Land Use Plan on Wednesday, Mr Lee pointed to the experience of Asian neighbours like Japan and Taiwan as examples of how the silver tsunami and dwindling workforce can destabilise economies.

For example, a city outside Nagoya called Gifu has seen shops along the main street closed for good.

In Hokkaido, in a small town called Yubari, half of the population is above 65 years old.

Mr Lee said Yubari's small working population means a measly tax base.

Four years ago, the city government went bust after owing a debt of US$315 million. The city was later forced to embark on an 18-year austerity drive.

Mr Lee said: "It retrenched half of its civil servants. Public service in the City was badly affected. The public library was gone. Six primary schools merged into one. The General Hospital closed down two thirds of its facilities to save utilities. It also halved its number of ambulances and asked its elderly patients to walk to the hospital by themselves."

The effect of two decades of economic stagnation in Japan, said Mr Lee has led to what is described as "the Waniguchi (crocodile's mouth) effect" - Soaring public expenditure coupled with a drop in tax revenue.

Mr Lee said the huge silver tsunami is destabilising Japan.

He said the country did not manage to raise its working population because it could not build a consensus to allow immigration to boost the workforce.

Similarly in Taiwan, Mr Lee pointed to an article which described the economy as "a small tax revenue country but large welfare state."

Mr Lee said Singapore is not operating in silos.

The world, he said, will continue to move forward, regardless of Singapore's demographic and internal problems.

It is against this larger picture, he said, that Singapore has to define its path forward.

Mr Lee said: "It makes sense for the nation to maintain a sustainable and stable Singaporean population while we are still young, and while external conditions are favourable."

Mr Lee noted there are lessons to be learnt from the experiences of other countries.

The number of elderly citizens in Singapore aged 65 and above will increase considerably from around 340,000 in 2011 to 900,000 by 2030.

Mr Lee cited China's rapidly ageing population to highlight issues which Singapore may face in the future.

He said: "China is beginning to see the "4-2-1" phenomenon: one child having to look after two parents and four grandparents. This inverted pyramid means a heavy burden for the children. When both parents and grandparents are retired, there is also the "aged caring for the aged" phenomenon and this is becoming common in our communities."

Echoing the sentiment, former Cabinet Minister Mah Bow Tan said Singapore cannot afford to lose its edge and become less competitive.

He urged Singaporeans to keep their hearts and minds open.

Mr Mah said: "We have spent a lot of our time looking inwards, talking about our discomforts, our space. We have not asked ourselves how we are going to compete with outside world. How we are going to earn a living to live the good life. It is almost taken from granted that the good life will continue even if growth slows. We expect new infrastructure to be rolled out, even as growth slows. We want more subsidies for health care and housing and let's have less foreign workers and a slower pace of life. Where will the revenue from all this come from?"

Mr Mah, who is MP for Tampines GRC, said government revenue comes mostly from income taxes, consumption taxes and asset taxes, all of which are dependent on economic growth.

He added Singapore needs a bigger population with better educated and trained citizens as well as talented non-residents to supplement the home-grown talent.

Hi yeokiwi,
Sorry. my understanding is that Japanese thinktanks are worried sick about the aging population but their politicians have no time to fix that kind of problems (except in an extremely piecemeal fashion). They are far more resistant to immigration than we are, for eg they recognize they could use some cheap foreign help to take care of their elderly, targeting the Filipinos, but somehow the legislation required the foreign workers to speak some high level Japanese which made it close to impossible to import enough.

Nonetheless we don't want to go down the Japanese route since just growing the foreign workers doesn't help, we need to raise the TFR as a base case, else it's really not a good solution.

To Temperament. I resent being called Sink porean and such derivatives and I do not believe I am the only one. I'm proud of being a Singaporean (in spite of a lot of things), so there.

(06-02-2013, 09:47 PM)arthur Wrote:

(06-02-2013, 09:18 PM)Musicwhiz Wrote:

(06-02-2013, 09:02 PM)d.o.g. Wrote: I vote Inderjit Singh for Home Affairs Minister!

Call me cynical, but I even went so far as to suspect that the PAP may have "planted" certain people to say certain things, all in the name of a "healthy debate".

Or perhaps I am simply too cynical after living on this little red dot for so long!

Its called the Good cop & Bad cop syndrome.
In any case, even if Mr Indergit Singh really reject the White Paper with his vote with some minority PAP MPs, it doesn't matter as its 81 vs 7 in Parliament.
The ruling party can sustain a 1/4 of their MPs within rank opposing the White Paper (AND the 7 WP MPs) and still get it approved.

That the reality within.
We, the commoners, just have to keep trying and keep helping to raise the voices of one another and lower society strata level who may not even be able to voice their grievances legibly through internet medium.

I do believe that he is there to play the good cop. Especially since the highest ranks of PAP MPs have already said that one party is good enough to create good debates.

MP Singh may even have the "cojones" to vote against this bill because the top PAP MPs can already estimate the number of "Fors" and "Against" there will be. Don't play play hor... people got a degree in maths hor.

Agree with godjira1. Low TFR in a developed economy and immigration are difficult issues. Problem is I think PAP got the strategy wrong with too much focus on GDP growth by perspiration.

We just need to look at our neighbours to see how "low" "sinkaporeans" have done over the past 50 years. We are at a position to import labour rather than export labour.

Besides Inderjit the other PAP "mole" was house speaker Tan Soo Khoon. I am glad someone took Goh Chok Tong to task. Give credit where it is due I say. BTW there is also another arcane thing called "party whip" when necessary to bring all these dissent in line... Maths is not required

I think the main issue here is that this paper is not addressing the root of the problem.

I think WP has done a great job in differentiating between TFR and working population. I also think that this is the way to go ahead.

If the government is really concern about the TFR, then be serious about raising the TFR.

Budget the money in such a way that greater emphasis is placed on raising TFR. Budget day is coming in a few days time. From this budget, we can see where does the goverment think deserve the most priority.

Talk is cheap. Put your money where your mouth is and show the citizens that you are serious about raising the TFR.

I am sure if you give away 4 room HDB to every couples that have 3 kids and more, the TFR will start going up like crazy.

All the talk for the next 3 months, to be forgotten in the next 3 years when some economic crisis comes, govt say that we Singapore still need to be number 1, keep our jobs, grow out population. Come 2025, realize again forecast population has already reached 7 million, infrastructure again unable to support or too old. Seriously if we do not remove the conflict of interest of e top ministers, there will be no independent opinion to represent the real Singapore majority. On the other hand, you can't vote the alternative party now as they are still growing and "trying to impress". My own 2 cents.

(06-02-2013, 11:46 PM)godjira1 Wrote: Hi yeokiwi,
Sorry. my understanding is that Japanese thinktanks are worried sick about the aging population but their politicians have no time to fix that kind of problems (except in an extremely piecemeal fashion). They are far more resistant to immigration than we are, for eg they recognize they could use some cheap foreign help to take care of their elderly, targeting the Filipinos, but somehow the legislation required the foreign workers to speak some high level Japanese which made it close to impossible to import enough.

Nonetheless we don't want to go down the Japanese route since just growing the foreign workers doesn't help, we need to raise the TFR as a base case, else it's really not a good solution.

To Temperament. I resent being called Sink porean and such derivatives and I do not believe I am the only one. I'm proud of being a Singaporean (in spite of a lot of things), so there.

My point is that the japan gov did not incur the wrath of the population by adopting liberal immigration policies despite their low TFR.
Yes. The Japanese are seeing the effects of aging but I have not heard them putting the blames on the gov.

Policies are not only for the future generations but also for those that are currently living under the effects of the implemented policies.

The resentments that we seen now in Singapore are unprecedented. If the gov and people cannot work together, it is an even greater calamity to the future of Singapore.