Go bold or go bust: Are the best days over for Singapore’s economy?

SINGAPORE’S rise from a poor nation to a global hub in one generation is a modern-day success story. Our gross domestic product grew forty-fivefold and per capita income twenty-fivefold by pivoting our economic strategies: export-led in the 1960s, capital-intensive in the 1980s, and knowledge-based in the 2000s. 

We now stand on the cusp of another pivot. We either drift into slow, mature growth, or leap onto the next “S-curve”. Geo-economic contestations, climate change and macroeconomic uncertainty demand a new way of thinking. Rapid technological advancements present opportunities – if we can seize them – to overcome our immutable constraints in land, manpower and carbon.

At the Global-City Singapore: SG60 and Beyond-themed conference organised by the Institute of Policy Studies and Singapore Business Federation in July, Prime Minister Lawrence Wong called for “big, bold moves”.