This is an excellent analysis of the Population White Paper. I have given the following comment to thee paper:
Quote:
The Government is blind to their errors made over two decades. By allowing property prices to escalate to ridiculously high levels, they have increased the cost of living and cost of housing to unbearable levels. This is the primary cause of the low fertility rates – most citizens cannot afford to raise children.
The policies that they had adopted for two decades to address the low fertility rate, and the many tweaks to these policies, failed miserably, and yet the persist on the same path of destruction.
We need to think out of the box. I will be giving some unconventional views in http://www.facebook.com/kinlian.
The Government made the wrong assumption in worrying about the old age support ratio. They worry that there are not enough young people to support the old people.
If they “open their eyes”, they will realize that it is the other way round. The parents have to support their children to make the down payments for the ridiculously high property price. The problem is – there are not enough rich parents due to the big income gap.
The problems caused by the bad PAP policies for two decades will take a long time to unravel. It may be best for the PAP to be replaced in 2016.
Unquote:
http://www.tremeritus.com/2013/02/09/population-white-paper-deconstructed/#comment-863558
Quote:
The Government is blind to their errors made over two decades. By allowing property prices to escalate to ridiculously high levels, they have increased the cost of living and cost of housing to unbearable levels. This is the primary cause of the low fertility rates – most citizens cannot afford to raise children.
The policies that they had adopted for two decades to address the low fertility rate, and the many tweaks to these policies, failed miserably, and yet the persist on the same path of destruction.
We need to think out of the box. I will be giving some unconventional views in http://www.facebook.com/kinlian.
The Government made the wrong assumption in worrying about the old age support ratio. They worry that there are not enough young people to support the old people.
If they “open their eyes”, they will realize that it is the other way round. The parents have to support their children to make the down payments for the ridiculously high property price. The problem is – there are not enough rich parents due to the big income gap.
The problems caused by the bad PAP policies for two decades will take a long time to unravel. It may be best for the PAP to be replaced in 2016.
Unquote:
http://www.tremeritus.com/2013/02/09/population-white-paper-deconstructed/#comment-863558
I must say that the part about the escalating cost of housing, HDB at that, being the primary cause of the low FTR, late marriages if at all was my belief too.
ReplyDeleteComing from a two child family I am still worried for my own children ability to get their own home / HDB without assisance from their in-laws or me.
What if I declared that my own late father gave as a gift to me and my wife the option to purchase amount of my Re-sale HDB back in the mid 80's?
So in some cases, this "taking care of the elder" myth ended as soon as the policy to allow "free market resale of HDB" & the legalization of that Cash Over Valuation got underway.
( Recalled that Cash above the Valuation was illegal before. Guess, when levy or tax could be collected, nothing else matter.)
The high property prices is needed because most people pay for their homes using CPF. They are using their retirement funds to pay for the roofs over their heads. Thus if they were to sell and downgrade the amount of money to return to CPF must include the interests over the many years. How welse could you do that if the price of their properties remain the same or increase at a rate lower than the CPF interest rate? Unfortunately selling HDB new flats are becoming a money-making scheme due to the market-rate `subsidy'. Like the COE, it becomes addictive to the government. Why settle for less when you can make more? So now we have fewer babies.
ReplyDeleteRepeat observation once again.
ReplyDeleteThe Cabinet members within the PAP family has nothing in common with its diverse races, languages and religions, held together only by smell of money and selfish self interests.
But money is the least reliable glue to bond this family together, and PAP top leaders are forced to continue the GDP race to fund the ever increasing financial demands of its members, without the M, the family would just break up. Grace Foo said it all, if she is not compensated enough financially, it's not worth her time to stay on as a PAP politician.
Thus, the birth of this White Paper, only new immigrants would add on GDP growth, not retiring baby boomers or the already aged senior citizens.
This looks like the real Agenda.