summary:
. why would singaporeans need coaxing
to maintain a replacement-level population rate?
they crack down on litterbugs with caning;
so, is the place just too harsh?
. in fact, up until recently, they actually did
crack down on having 3 children;
even though 2.1 is the replacement rate .
. now the gov is seeing major life extensions,
and they are getting worried about soon being
overtaxed by a heavy elder-to-worker ratio .
. it's pointed out that their elderly
currently care for both themselves and children;
but this won't always be the case,
because the gov can see that in time
their elderly will get the modern food diseases
and they will need the modern medical treatments
-- which will far exceed what they have in savings .
learn from singapore:
. they had religious overpopulation
and they burned in poverty and crime;
only when had their Stop at Two program
and got the jobs that globalization took from
affluent countries like usa
did they themselves become affluent .
. usa's greatness has actually come from underpopulation:
usa has a naturally low population density per resource;
but that of course will soon change
as the usa becomes overrun by religious overpopulators .
. part of reaganomics is globalized employment recruitment
but when the resources are dwindling,
this turns into a roman-style ponzy scheme:
the young citizens have to work very hard
to pay for the wealth of the older citizens;
and you can unload somewhat by outsourcing;
but then you have a growing unemployment problem
which is equivalent to overpopulation,
that costs us more in police and poverty taxes .
. compound those costs with the new healthcare:
we can extend the retirement period indefinitely
just by throwing more money at the patient;
-- patients who earned their keep when younger
only when confined to the old-style low-tech healthcare .
. if you do believe in a healthy reaganomics
you'd have to believe in an old-style healthcare
which virtually means euthanizing the patient
now that we have the power to keep them alive .
. there are 2 paths you can take sustainably:
either the judeo-christian avoidance of death
is poisoning your reaganomic way;
or we need to admit that reaganomics
is actually poisoning our seniors;
because, when you retire people
or let them eat unregulated junkfood,
this is when the medical conditions
that need the most expensive treatments:
heart disease, cancer, kidney failure .
web: singapore's fertility crisis:
the increasingly educated decreasingly proliferate:
. Singapore's state controlled newspapersingaporemind.blogspot.com/2012/08/:
The Straits Times of Feb 13, 2012
says that "while money tops the reasons
why Singaporeans are not having more babies,
being not mentally prepared
is proving a growing barrier".
-- about 2 in 5 polled last year said they were
emotionally ill equipped to have children
compared with just 3 in 20 in 2010."
It says this is the second most cited reason by couples
in a recent survey while the other reasons were
"time, career and the lack of
quality affordable childcare support".
It is simply the refusal of Singaporeans who are
now increasingly educated and sophisticated
to have babies in an island ... dictatorship ... .
. educated Singaporeans in an already tiny island
continue to emigrate to Australia
and the rest of the Western world .
[. and in typical reaganomic fashion
catering to the needs of multinationals,
they get labor globally for the best price
or they get trusted professionals
from their own country of origin .]
[. a commenter notes that foreign workers
are reproducing at record rates ?
it's not clear who's being called the foreigner
since singapore is nearly all foreigner!
(there are very few malasians);
perhaps they refer to those from
neither china nor india .]
. 30-40 years ago (a time of utter squalor);the nptd.gov.sg report:
singaporeans were punished for having
replacement rates of children
("Stop at Two" program).
. now a few big families are encouraged:
professionals get a tax rebate for having kids;
however, if a labor-class man marries a foreigner,
none of his dependents are considered to be citizens .
. the Stop at Two program was right for that time.
All you have to do is look at the countries where
the majority do not practice family planning.
The per capita GDP of such countries
generally underperform others around the same region.
And the irony is that the more religious the country is,
the more crimes you have because of poverty.
[. slowing rates of immigration
is not easily within gov control;
because, their wealth was created by
inviting multinationals to reside in singapore,
and they can pressure the gov
to globalize the workforce .]
. the Singaporean's NPTD
(National Population and Talent Division)
has released a paper,
and features a population website,
to help with understanding the options and trade-offs
the country has to make in the face of
a growing elder-to-worker ratio
given the declining birth rates .
In the past the govt has put forth
many other reasons for the foreign influx
- businesses find it hard to get Singapore workers,
there are jobs Singaporeans won't take,
there are skills we cannot find among Singaporeans.
. use of these reasons for the large influx
does not explain why foreigners are
imported for jobs that Singaporeans also do
when reasonable wages are paid .
Maybe this is why the govt has chosen to use
the low fertility rate of Singaporeans
as a justification for importing more people.
. fertility's replacement rate is
2.1 children per couple;
whereas Sg's have been below that since 1975
-- that's a steady decline from 5+ kids in 1960 .
. the decline is less but steady since 1990:
it is now 1.1 children per couple .
The Singapore govt brought in 5-10 times
the people needed to make up for
the shortfall in fertility rate
-- causing so much overpopulation
that it's caused a surge in both
housing prices and the cost of living .
The main reason for the large influx
is to generate economic growth
by expanding the workforce
and to meet the demands of employers who
do not want to pay higher wages to hire citizens .
Our intake of new citizens
increased from an average of 8,200 per year
between 1987 and 2006,
to about 18,500 per year in the last 5 years.
We also took in an average of
58,000 Permanent Residents (PRs) per year
between 2004 and 2008,
but have tightened our population.
. elder per worker ratio was 1/6.3 in 2011,history and demographics of Singapore:
projected to be an expensive 1/2.1 by 2030 .
[. the gist of this gov fertility drive
is to inform people that things have changed:
they plan on inviting fewer immigrants
in order to accommodate more citizen growth .
. they are worried about families being able to
care for their elderly in the face of a rising
number of elderly per citizen household .]
in 2011.12, there were
3.27M born citizens
0.54M invited citizens;
and 1.46M temporaries (includes foreign students)
-- 40% of marriages are to foreigners
but are still considered to be temp's
unless passing the invite qualifications later .
-- 40% of temps are labor jobs;
-- 12% of temps are skilled and exec's
"(for expanding into international markets
and attracting global investments -- esp'ly in
R&D, finance, and aerospace engineering).
. life expectancy has increased since 1980
from 72 to 82 -- world-class health .
[. in the future, this will increasingly drive inflation:
people spending money instead of creating it;
plus elders will spend more on high-tech healthcare .
. currently,
housing costs are inflated for the same reason as NY':
this is a big player in globalized capitalism
by being very business-friendly while having very little space .
. part of the reason is continuity and growth:
just like NY was one of usa's first major eastern ports,
singapore has been a british trading port since 1824
and most of the population are immigrant labor
being there for mining and rubber plantations;
they were sweltering in poverty and racial conflicts
so it was easy for the newly independent gov
to offer great deals for globalized capitalists .]
Before the british in 1818,
there were around 1,000 living in Singapore,
mostly Malays and a few dozen Chinese.
[singapore is the kuwait of malasia]
Many Chinese and Indian immigrants came to Singapore
to work in the rubber plantations and tin mines,
and their descendents later formed the
bulk of Singapore's population .
By 1869, Singapore's population had reached 100,000.
but there was to be a lot of bloodshed .
self rule in 1959:
The People's Action Party (PAP) won
by courting the Chinese-speaking majority .
. for a while they were united with malasia,
(Malay is still the "national language"
[but, that is just singapore's latin
-- all schooling is taught in english]);
. eventually, there was too much racial tension
between the chinese and and malasians,
so malasia separated once again .
. in 1965, the pressing problems were
10–12% unemployment, housing, education .
. then huge building projects sprung up
to provide affordable public housing
to resettle the squatters.
. the 1968 Central Provident Fund (CPF) Housing Scheme,
allowed residents to use their compulsory savings account
to purchase HDB[public housing] flats
and gradually increased home ownership in Singapore.
[. it features 50 year housing loans;
said to be subsidized but that simply means
profit-controlled:
selling price = building cost + "discounted" margin.]
. in the 1980s and 1990s
the unemployment rate was falling to 3%;
and, up until 1999,
real GDP growth was averaging 8% .
During the 1980s,
Singapore began to upgrade to higher-technology industries,
such as the wafer fabrication sector,
in order to compete with its neighbours
which now had cheaper labour .
. Singapore is #3 for per capita income;
5 million people in Singapore,
of which 2.91 million were born locally.
the majority are Chinese,
with Malays and Indians forming significant minorities.
four official languages:
80% English (only 40% in 1990)
-- the national instruction lang,
65% Chinese, 17% Malay, 4% Tamil.
Buddhism 33%
Christianity 18%
No religion 17%
Islam 15%
Taoism 11%
Hinduism 5.1%
. some 45% have only a grade-6 education,
but singapore is top-5 in math & sci testing .
. their healthcare system is 6th,
while spending remains low;
instead of insurance,
they have compulsory savings,
and then catastrophic is handled by state funding .
. in 2008,
31.9% of healthcare was funded by the government.
It accounts for approximately 3.5% of Singapore's GDP.
80% live in high-rise, price-controlled flats .
11th in quality of life -- best in asia .
. the temp is a bizarre 73..88F all year round!
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