Let’s go for a generous SG60 baby gift and Baby Bonus
ACCORDING to the United Nations, a society is super-aged when the percentage of the population aged 65 or older reaches 21 per cent. Singapore is estimated to attain super-aged status in 2026.
Even as numbers of the aged surge, the birth rate of many countries falters. For Elon Musk, chief executive officer of Tesla and X, the lack of births has been one of his extracurricular preoccupations. In 2022, he tweeted that “a collapsing birth rate is the biggest danger civilization faces, by far”.
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development says that a total fertility rate of 2.1 children per woman ensures a broadly stable population, assuming no net migration and unchanged mortality. For Singapore, its resident total fertility rate for 2023 was 0.97 per female, down from 1.04 previously.
Musk too, recently singled out Singapore, with the stark prediction that the Little Red Dot “(and many other countries) are going extinct”.
On my recent holiday to Hong Kong, the staff at the hotel I stayed at included a large proportion of young and youngish workers. The hotel guests were mainly young families travelling from China, which gave the place a much more energetic feel, compared with the sedate pace I’m used to in Singapore. Even if younger folk lack maturity and experience, I can’t help but be buoyed by their buzz and energy.
As Singapore gears up to celebrate its 60th year of independence, it is no callow youth but a respected city-state, commanding a certain stature and respect on the world stage. While Musk’s dire predictions smack of shock value, there is a point to be made – that population growth is important, even essential, for economic prosperity.
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For Singapore, a younger population would give it some of the energy and can-do spirit it had as one of the four pioneering Asian tigers.
Going all out to raise Singapore’s birth rate should be a key focus as the Republic heads into its 60th year and beyond. True, immigration can help plug the gap and deliver manpower on demand, but the challenge of assimilation can be a major downside.
Growing one’s own timber – to borrow a phrase from UOB CEO Wee Ee Cheong – is still the best long-term solution.
Already, many “procreation measures” have been proposed in previous Budgets. For example, the Baby Bonus has been enhanced over the years. There will be 10 extra weeks of shared parental leave amounting to a total of 30 weeks of government-paid parental leave by April 2026. There are more childcare spaces available as well.
The SG50 gift for babies – a kiddie suitcase of goodies including a gold-plated medallion – wasn’t overly lavish, but it contributed to lifting the overall mood in 2015 and helped create an environment where everyone seemed to be having babies or at least talking about them. Whether the gift helped, there were 33,725 babies born to Singaporeans here in 2015, the highest number in over a decade. The number of SG50 babies even bested 2012’s bounty of just over 33,200 births in the Year of the Dragon.
Now, in 2025, the Year of the Dragon is on its way out, but the baby tally is unlikely to beat that of the 2012 cohort. As we head into SG60, let’s bring back the feel-good factor with a generous SG60 baby gift, and let’s continue to talk about babies.
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