Still not enough babies to fight aging population in Singapore
Singapore is reportedly still shortof 60,000 babies to counter our aging population despite the efforts made by the local government during the past 5 years, to encourage citizens to give birth. Some examples of the government's initiatives include the baby bonus, extended maternity leave for mothers and domestic helper subsidy.
Financial aids appears to work as the extra push to have children, and if they already do have children, to have even more of them; however, the problem may be more skin deep than it seems.
Due to the strong influence of the western culture on the younger generation in Singapore, many couples are now more up for lovebirds marriage life, rather than rush to family planning straight after marriage. Cost of living and raising a child also deters Singaporeans against having children or more children. In addition, the younger generation often avoid shouldering responsibilities like bearing and raising a child. Such characteristics of the Singaporean generation now greatly lower the appeal of such financial aids provided by the government.
The government should therefore shift their focus to educating the citizens, in particular those that fall under the age of 21 to 40, as they belong to the group of Singaporeans most likely to be at the phase of their life where they may consider doing some family planning.
By playing up the importance of family life, citizens may start to comprehend the need and joy for family starting and expansion to complete their life. This can be done through planting such pro family planning messages in media mediums such as in movies, drama serials, even songs, and on the prints.
yes, definitely. the government does seem to be unaware that the policy that once proved so successful does not hold the same appeal in current times. this, of course, leads to the increase in foreign workers in singapore, whether specialised or otherwise. and leads to more public displeasure where everyone complains that foreigners are taking up too much space on the job market - hardly seeming to realise that singaporeans as a whole, are hardly doing their part to rectify their situation.
ReplyDeleteAnd of course, increasing the influx of foreigners into Singapore does not solve the problem as it is only a short term solution. The government is not doing any good to solve the problem by just trying to make up the numbers in the population with foreigners.
ReplyDeletethat's true. foreigners also bring about other rounds of problems such as further culture dilution and other social issues. They also take up job opportunities available for the local. besides they dun necessarily will stay in singapore to contribute to the birth rate. they probably just came to earn some money and then head back.
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