4/14/2013

The unhappy young and their broken Singapore Dream





The Singapore Dream was like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow to many older Singaporeans. To many older Singaporeans, the PMEs, this pot is now missing. Someone has shifted it and they could not see anything there. The only people seeing this pot of gold are the foreigners replacing them in their high paying jobs. The Singapore Dream has to be modified to mean the foreigner’s Singapore Dream. To the older Singaporeans, the Dream has become a bad Dream, a nightmare in the making.

Are the young Singaporeans seeing the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow as well? They better be. They have paid heavily to grow up, invested heavily in themselves, with some parents selling their homes, emptying their savings, to get them a good education. Would they be able to land a job that makes the return on their parent’s investment worthy and economically meaningful? Would their income be enough to pay for the little public flat that is now the only achievable and realistic dream? Would they be able to buy that elusive car, like the Americans needing a horse in the good old cowboy days? And would they still have enough in their savings when the time comes for retirement? Given the extremely high cost of living and inflation, every young Singaporean today must need to earn an income that is equivalent to three times their need to cover housing, medical and retirement.

The young Singaporeans are going to be the new breed of highly in debt Singaporeans never seen or heard before. They will incur debt for their education and another 30 year of mortgages that could be in several hundred thousands or more. They will be indebted to the CPF, to pay a ransom to be kept by the CPF meant for their own good and retirement. Then there is a huge debt to bring up a family with a couple of kids.

The life of the young Singaporeans, excluding the rich scions of old rich, ministers and top professionals, will be one of working and working to pay and pay and at the end of it, nothing to compare with the foreigners whose dream will be to return home to be a rich land lord or owning their own businesses. The Singapore Dream of the young Singaporeans is to have the blessing of working till their die, no breaks, to be able to pay for all the debts that are predictable and designed into the system and into their lives.

Every year about 50,000 young Singaporeans will come of age and start to hang a millstone over their neck, to start their new lives as adults. The new citizens coming in too will have to hang the same millstone over their necks unless they are really super talents and can afford the expensive housing and lifestyle here. The group of highly in debt young and new people cannot afford a major economic crisis or a personal crisis in their lives. They will be heavily in debt and their lives will be in ruins should it happen. Without an income is simply unacceptable with the kind of debt in their hands. They are the new debtors of a Singapore economic miracle formula based on high inflation, and high cost of living and increasing debt of the young people.

Hail the new Singapore Dream, small flat, no car and a big debt to service for a life time. This is the standard copy of the life of the new average young Singaporeans. Are their parents worried and want this to be the Dream of their children? Anyone can see why the Dreams of FTs and young Singaporeans are different, one full of promises of wealth and another on the brink of becoming a nightmare?

19 comments:

Virgo 49 said...


My two children, both are single and I encouraged them to stay single.

Either we bequeath our existing flat to them for the balance lease or hopefully our place be placed under SERs with new lease and we go e them all the same to complete their life cycle.

At least they still ha d their savings and hopefully their balance cof monies if any with them when they are old or retired.

Come 2016, if the PAP govt is not kicked out then, have to migrate or else will not be able to breathe anymore with 6.9 million beings and trashes.

Anonymous said...

Are Sinkies unhappy?

Anonymous said...

Yes in our generation we can achieve our dream but the current young PMET can not even earn more than taxi driver, really pathetic.

Anonymous said...

Do not under estimate the youngs in Sin.

Just look at how many of them were at the Japan Auto Show.

Anonymous said...

Vote Opposition.
For a new Singapore Dream.

The old dream-maker is dying.
Will be gone very soon.

Anonymous said...

Seah Chiang Nee's Saturday column

[Jobless in the republic]


"PMET
has become a familiar word in the republic in recent years,
one that is increasingly associated with some of the woes of the new Singapore.

It is an institution
that has been badly affected by the country’s immigration strategy of increasing the population
and providing cheaper manpower for businesses.

'If the govt is right in saying
that Singapore’s future can be secured through mass immigration,
then we, the present generation,
have to be the sacrificed,' said a retrenched engineer.

Although the govt has recently raised restrictions and reduced the foreigner intake as a result of public protests,
the overall immigration policy is being firmly pursued.

How badly are PMETs hit?

Two years ago
there was an inkling of things to come when a cabinet minister in charge of the labour movement, NTUC,
talked of plans to go for cheap labour.

Lim Swee Say said his unions would help put on track
a “Cheaper, Better, Faster” economy.

This sort of leadership philosophy has stagnated productivity and helped widen the gap between the rich and the poor."


http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2013/4/13/focus/12958275&sec

Anonymous said...

Uncle Leong's latest Qs

[TOTE Board donated $400m to Gardens by the Bay?]


"I refer to the article
'Tote Board’s donations hit $1.2b' (Sunday Times, Apr 14).

Can you imagine what $400 million in a year can do for the needy in Singapore?

Finally, I wonder how much funds in total does the Tote Board have?

How much does it collect in revenue every year..
is acceptable for Singapore’s largest charity organisation, established by an Act of Parliament.


http://leongszehian.com/?p=4331

Anonymous said...

People have to learn to open their eyes and vote properly and stop voting for conyou or any party who treats the people like unwanted shit.

Anonymous said...

11.23 It is no longer 60%.PAPi needs to satisfied the new citizen so 30% of goodied goes to them.30% No goodies BECOME ANGRy. New citizen are very talented and smart.so 10% will vote for PAPi and 20% fence sitting.in this way,they will still be pamper and loved for they know pinky will court then more.

Anonymous said...

Even if all sinkies vote for other parties, the election boxes can be swaped half way before reaching the counting center.

Anonymous said...

The singapore dream ceased to exist when conyou was first voted into power. Why would people want to vote for a party that makes the people unable to have a freehold house and a private car and a stable job and affordable healthcare and basic freedom? There must be election fraud since then.

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Anonymous said...

When I started work in 1980, my pay is 6 times more than a secondary school graduate. To day, a graduate pay is only two times. Severe competition from FT Bo bian lor as 60% think its better this way.

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Anonymous said...

Putting the issue in better perspective, I think it would be more appropriate to say that younger Singaporeans are just different in money management from their parent's generation, and I mean those parents born before WW2.

Now, the present generation follows spending habits that the older generation would have looked upon as irresponsible. Their parents would always save up first to buy whatever they need, while the younger generation would buy first and pay with their future earnings. Everything is paid for with future earnings, but with jobs less than secure nowadsys, serious problems will come when jobs are lost.

In such a situation, savings would be difficult, other than the compulsory CPF contributions. How then can the young hope to enjoy their retirement dream? The Singapore Dream has already turned into just a red indian pipe dream? Keep dreaming!

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Anonymous said...

If a country continue to focus on technology, innovations and branding, will it continue to argue want or want don’t foreigners. It rarely got to keep harping want or don’t foreigners, of course 10 percents of the foreigners which is need in many of the advanced countries, but it can’t be to much to the detriment of the own populations? Is it something to keep arguing about this topic, many successful nation the main focus is their local, how to make product that can sell at a premium like th swiss watches or attract premium tourists etc?

This foreigners can only play a supporting role, the survival of a nation depend on the locals, if face economical crisis like 97, will they leave or like the Greece, the wealthy Russian left them and left Greece in the state of bankruptcy? No nation can keep importing foreigners to drive the economy, especially so with a small island like Singapore?

Massive incentives from our casinos or indirect taxes and foreign reserve need to stimulate the local creativity and innovations and branding, so that many patents will generate the futures products of Singapore and upgrade on high value economy that don’t depend on cheap workers, so that the bottom sections can see better wages like some of the advanced nations?

Small countries like Sweden and Israel, focus on it local citizen, where got these type of headaches of need to keep increasing the foreign population. Even if is for low birth rate, the populations should be constants, not keep increasing it to drive the economy, which don’t benefit much to the working classes.

We should learn from small countries like Sweden and Israel, little and no resources can do so well. We has at least, at one the heaviest traffic location in the world.

If we keep increasing the population, one of these day will be like HOng KOng many got to life in cages, simply not enough resources to build home for so many migrants?

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

We may have adopted a new philosophy that we can keep on importing foreingers to replace the lesser talented locals and eventually the foreigners will rule the locals.

Ⓜatilah $ingapura⚠️ said...

>> Every year about 50,000 young Singaporeans will come of age and start to hang a millstone over their neck, to start their new lives as adults.

I think that is a good thing. It helps build character, grit and determination.

You can't get too soft on the young.