yeokiwi Wrote:Another way to solve the problem is to boost the fertility rate which is not necessary controllable by gov.
From the various news reports put out by the government, barriers to having more children include:
cost of raising children (childcare, education)
cost of housing (forced dual income, less time/money for kids)
cost of transport (cars)
The government can bring down the cost of childcare if it wishes - by building more childcare centres (which it is doing), by training more childcare workers (I do not know if this is being done) and by making leases affordable (true for PCF, not sure about the others). It can even exempt childcare businesses from tax if it wishes.
The government can bring down the cost of education if it wishes - e.g. by increasing the education subsidies (thus reducing fees) or increasing the number of bursaries (to help poor students).
The government can bring down the cost of housing if it wishes - by having HDB sell flats at cost, selling land to HDB at a nominal price, increasing the supply of flats (this IS being done) etc.
The government can bring down the cost of transport if it wishes. After all ERP and COE are government creations. And likewise the government can nationalize the public transport operators if it wishes. Then it can set low fares and yet deliver a high standard of service (perhaps at the cost of losing money).
So far we have not seen any radical measures to drastically bring down the cost of living. There have been numerous financial handouts along the way, but they do not even begin to address the fundamental issue of runaway costs. The increased baby bonus is small potatoes when sending your child to non-PCF childcare can cost $1,000 per month (even the Straits Times acknowledged that in childcare you get what you pay for). The housing grants are also a token gesture when the cost of a flat has doubled in the last 5 years.
Fundamentally, what all this means is that the government is not interested ENOUGH to raise the birthrate. Immigration is viewed as preferable - hence the growth in immigrant population.
Never forget how powerful the government is.
Singapore may be a small country, but within it the government is all-powerful. When it gives excuses for why something cannot be done, it is simply saying that
it does not want to do it badly enough.