Tan Kin Lian's Blog: Subsidised dating

Saturday, August 14, 2010

Subsidised dating

Read this story.

My view
I am very sad to read about the millions of dollars that are being wasted pursuing wrong strategies, e.g. subsidise dating. The underlying problems are the high cost of living and the burden of national service on young Singaporean males. This has been evident for many years and are getting worse as time goes by. But the government refuses to recognize the root causes and continue to pursue the ineffective strategies.

5 comments:

ron said...: Lets allow nature to take its course.

NS,careers, education all play their part in this. I am not certain if the removal of NS will cause a big shift towards marriage.

The issue of marriage is prevalent in economies that are very urban and progressive.; August 14, 2010 12:52 PM
yujuan said...: Our Govt knows pretty well the root causes, but they can't find the way to solve the problem, the same with "Two is enough" population campaign decades ago, they just can't unravel the damage done. So, use the short cut way, throw public funds to push our young to date, hopefully marry and increase our population with kids.
Bur our children turn around and say "Mum, I can't even afford to upkeep myself, what more with wife and kids. Main, main, okay, further than that, no way".; August 14, 2010 2:36 PM
Vincent said...: You all miss the point. Government is trying to grow the dating agencies industry, that's why the subsidise dating. It's all about part of increasing our GDP.; August 14, 2010 4:45 PM
Unknown said...: its like prices of properties went up so high that the size of the unit starts to get smaller to make it more affordable. they then turn around to say that people now like smaller units as very few choose the larger units. so it depends how you look at it like the glass is half full or half empty.

if u dont think, you kena cheated; August 14, 2010 5:18 PM
rex said...: REX comments as follows,

Actually, the "subsidised dating" concept has already been existence since the time of SDU twenty or more years ago, in the good old days when the flat and property prices are still manageable.
So the recent govt renewed commitment to new ideas in this industry is just a carry forward idea which really i cannot find anything wrong with.
However, i do agree that there are other factors such as the high cost of living and NS issues which effectively nullifies all the efforts on "subsidised dating" policies. If the goverhnment could only accept the concept of having a lower operating costs (such as reduced salaries) and forthwith slash rentals and parking fees, etc, and gst on essential items, etc. the cost of living can go down very very easily.
As another example, with a stroke of the pen, the toll at tuas bridge was recently slashed 35% overnight by goverhment. The cost of living is very very very easily controlled by the goverhmnent. It is articicially being propped up for reasons which we all pre-suppose, that is to keep feeding the dogs and octopuses.

zero; August 15, 2010 8:12 AM