Ageing Population and Economic Growth in Singapore

With the increasing ageing population in Singapore, the country's economy is facing challenges in terms of productivity and resource utilization. This article discusses the impact of ageing population on Singapore's economy, the challenges it poses, and potential solutions to address them. It emphasizes the need for social initiatives, attracting skilled workforce, and implementing policies to support the ageing population. The article also highlights the importance of private pensions and healthcare, as well as promoting a healthy lifestyle among citizens. Overall, it emphasizes the need for aligning ageing population policies with economic growth for a sustainable future.

"Ageining population to drag down and hamper the annual GDP rate and per capital
growth of economy of Singapore
Module Number-

Introduction
With the increasing aging population in Singapore, the economics of the country has been
shrinking throughout the time. The main reason behind this case is based on the productivity of
the people residing in Singapore and failure to deploy the available resources to its optimum
level. It is considered that economy of Singapore is based on its set policies and program
considering Singapore free market country. Singapore's economy is marked as one of the most
open, least corrupted, pro-business and with low tax rates. Singapore is ranked among the best
GDP per capita in the whole world. Singapore's economy is a major FDI (Foreign Direct
Investments) outflow financer to the world. The government-linked companies are the main
focal point which have been operating their business and impacting the economic growth fo the
Singapore in positive manner. These companies own majority stakes in other nation’s large
companies. However, the main factor of ageing problems is also related to the health of the
citizens and less effective life style of the people resides in Singapore. The government should
take social initiatives to make the people of the country healthy

Economic of Singapore
Singapore's Economy has also benefitted from Foreign Direct Investments inflow as
Singapore is highly attractive in its investment climate and also has a very stable political
environment. Singapore is a very open market for the world. Singapore has also evolved as a
very important transshipment port. It means Singapore could thus say to rely on the extended
concept of intermediary trade to trade. The companies from the world have invested in Singapore
for providing facilities of the port. The companies import, store or trade to export the
merchandise again towards the new market. Usually, this kind of facilities are used by the
companies which trade merchandise over a long distance, Singapore plays a vital role worldwide
providing companies facilities to the companies of port for long distance trades. The port of
Singapore is considered to be the biggest occupied port in the world1. The government of
Singapore needs to focus on importing the services from other country by migrating other
professionals in its economy which will be useful to strengthen the population numbers.
However, it is analyzed that providing a good perspective of living, jobs, and good economic
environment will be the good plan to attract the attract the skilled workforce throughout the
world to be the part of the workforce of the country and will help the government to generate
revenues to run social welfare policies
1 Louisa Picco, et al. "Economic burden of multimorbidity among older adults: impact on healthcare and
societal costs." (2016) 16(1) BMC health services research 173.

Source:-https://o4uxrk33.com/dqp7qw48?key=0f22c1fd609f13cb7947c8cabfe1a90d&psid=14399615
The ageing population and economic of Singapore
It is analyzed that if the fertility rates set in the Singapore is designed at the set
current ;evel then the ageing population will result to drag by 1.5% on per GDP growth rate
(GDP) growth every year until 2060. Researches show that by the year 2080 91 elderly citizens
will be there in 100 working-age Singaporeans. This was based on the assumptions that total
fertility rate stagnates at 1.3, with 20000 immigrants adding new to the population every year2.
Ageing will lead to a decrease in the industrial growth and GDP of the country. The
ageing population poses multiple challenges like increased economic growth, increased number
of the aged population available in the labour market of Singapore. Because of ageing the
government will have to spend more on social needs that may hike the Tax rates for the country,
this, however, will create a problem for the country because Singapore is well known worldwide
2 Renuga Nagarajan, Aurora AC Teixeira, and Sandra Silva. "The impact of population ageing on economic
growth: a bibliometric survey." (2017) 62(2) The Singapore Economic Review 275-296.

for its Low Tax rates for a business to establish and people all around the world invest in the
country for its healthy business environment. Ageing problems is a major issue that the country
of Singapore is facing right now. The majority of the population of Singapore is aged and thus
yield less productivity then the people who are middle or young aged. Therefore, it has been the
biggest issue and hurdle in the economic development of Singapore. The increased aged people
numbers lower down the productivity of the economy and also result to increased time
consumption for every sort of work as compared to the normal time. Majority of the aged people
doesn't even contribute to the GDP as they get retired or sick. Even the aged people get
dependent on others for the fulfillment of their needs of health care, economic and stable life
after retirement. Also, the expenditure of the aged people increases comparatively to young
people due to their needs of medical as well as social needs. It is analyzed that the set prevalence
of the health condition increases with the increase in the age and as per the estimated made by
the department of health, it is found that these conditions account for 70% of the total health and
social care spending in economy of the Singapore. The Department of health also estimates that
the average cost of providing health care facilities to aged people is three times greater than the
average cost of providing medical facilities to young people3.
3 Augustine Tan. "Economic prospects of Singapore." (2016)17(3).SINGAPORE 2065: Leading Insights on
Economy and Environment from 50 Singapore Icons and Beyond. 213-218.

Source:-https://o4uxrk33.com/dqp7qw48?key=0f22c1fd609f13cb7947c8cabfe1a90d&psid=14399615
It is analyzed that fiscal pressure arise from the decline working population or negative or less
effective usage of the available resource in economy. It increases the tendency ratio of the
economy4. It is found that when the low number of the people are indulged in employment then
it impacts the business growth, economic condition and lower down the value currency of the
country. The Old age people are mostly pensioners, so they spend less than also they don't pay
much taxes. This may lead to a hike in taxes as the government will spend more in social welfare
and programs to find out the solution the ageing issues in the economy. This will divert the time
of the government and the impact the monetary policies and economic development work plan of
government5.
It is analyzed that many developed countries are consistently facing the issues of the ageing
populations in their workforce such as Japan, Russia and including Singapore. . There have been
many suggestions of how to deal with this. It is related to the aspects of economic policies which
may help in relieving the pressure of the ageing population on Singapore's health and economic
systems and also identify the increasing rate of the undertaken labour workforce in Singapore's
population6. However, government of Singapore has focused on formulating the policies and
control plan to eradicate this issue from the economy. There is a wide range of public policies
available to the government responses to the ageing population problems7.
4 Abbas Al-Hdabi. "Laboratory investigation on the properties of asphalt concrete mixture with Rice Husk
Ash as filler." (2016) 126(2) Construction and Building Materials 544-551
5 Khun Eng Kuah. "Singapore State and the Emergence of Buddhist Welfarism." (2016) 41(4) Ageing
International 335-349.
6 John McLaren, Allan Yeo, and Michael Sweet. "Australia is facing a housing affordability crisis: Is the
solution to this problem the Singapore model of housing?." (2016) 10(4) Australasian Accounting, Business and
Finance Journal 38-57
7 Siow Ann Chong, et al. "A population-based survey of mental disorders in Singapore." (2017) 19(3)
Singapore Ageing economic review

Source:https://tradingeconomics.com/singapore/population
The government may increase the workforce proportion in the country. It is analyzed that the
increasing rate of participation in workforce (or the amount of the people in the workforce) can
be done by encouraging the young skilled immigrants to migrate to the country. It is done by
undertaking the increasing number of immigrants the country accepts now or in the upcoming
future, or by decreasing the standards of the immigration. This may help to prevent the economic
problems which the government may face in the future due to ageing population. Nonetheless, it
will increase the amount of people in the workforce. Providing a good perspective of living, jobs,
and good economic environment will attract the skilled workforce throughout the world to be the
part of the workforce of the country and will help the government to generate revenues to run
social welfare policies for the ageing population and the workforce. By this, the work
environment and enthusiasm among the workforce as well as ageing population will be
maintained and it will help in the economic stability of the country8.
8 David chan. "The Future of Singapore's Ageing Population: Ageing as Asset and Adaptation."
(2016) SINGAPORE 2065: Leading Insights on Economy and Environment from 50 Singapore Icons and Beyond.
39-44

One more solution which the government has to minimize the problem of ageing solution is to
raise the retirement age. This is one of the most feasible options which the government has for
the solution to this ageing problem. Raising the retirement age is also very beneficial as a point
of view from the economy of the country. Raising the retirement age leads to more tax revenue
from older people. By this, the older people serve to the workforce for more years than the
retirement age and thus giving good tax revenue to the government and also this helps the
government to run several social welfare policies and gives the nation good economic stability.
Also, increasing the retirement age will also increase the consumer spending by the people for
more year that will also the local market a boost which will help to maintain the economic
stability9.
9 See Ming Lim and Sin Eng Chia. "The prevalence of fatigue and associated health and safety risk factors
among taxi drivers in Singapore." (2015) 56(2) Singapore medical journal 92

Source:-https://www.straitstimes.com/business/economy/singapore-will-reach-critical-demographic-
crossroad-in-2018-says-uob-economist

The ageing population day-by-day is creating a major issue in economic growth. In this case
scenario, the government should encourage the private sector for providing pensions and health
care. The government should make it mandatory for the companies to provide the employees a
private pension and health care facilities10. Alternatively, the government should also promote
the people of the country to have private pension plan to strengthen the value of the capital they
keep safe in their account. However, for this, the government has focused on developing
taxation planning and offering residents of the country several types of the tax deductions and
rebates to promote capital saving and health care facilities in the economy. This step will also
reduce the burden of pensions to be given by the government to the people, however, the main
reason of increasing old age workforce is that many old retired person does not have future
secure plan. Therefore, there is still a need for means-tested pensions11.
The main factor of ageing problems is also related to the health of the citizens. The government
should take social initiatives to make the people of the country healthy. The more the person will
be healthy the more he will be able to work in older age. Government of the country should run
some programs to motivate the people of the country to stay healthy and fit. The government
should run mandate programs for the people of the country to stay fit. Staying fit will keep a
citizen more energetic throughout his work career and even in an older age, the person will work
more efficiently. The government should also evolve with the technology to make the citizens
healthier and work efficiently to prevent ageing and make the country's economic conditions
more stable12.
10 Feng Guo, et al. "The effects of age on the crash risk associated with driver distraction." (2017) 46(1)
International Journal of epidemiology 258-265.
11 Tianqing Wu, et al. "Experimental Study of Ageing Effect in Pool Boiling Heat Transfer." (2018) 2(1)
IEEE 20th Electronics Packaging Technology Conference (EPTC). IEEE,
12 Kai Wei , et al. "Frailty and malnutrition: related and distinct syndrome prevalence and association among
community-dwelling older adults: Singapore Longitudinal Ageing Studies." (2017) 18(12) Journal of the American
Medical Directors Association 1019-1028

Conclusion
It is analyzed that ageing population in the economy leads to several problem in the
economy for instance, increased business costing, loss of currency value, low productivity, less
level of export as compared to import and other deficiency in usage of the available assets in
economy. Now, in the end, it could be inferred that if the people in the economy are not
productive or not deploying the available assets effectively then it will not only shrink the GDP
value of the economy but also lower down the currency value of economy on an international
level. The crux of this essay is that if Singapore wants to strengthen its economic position then it
will first have to focus on developing ageing population rules and regulation which aligned with
the economic growth and sustainable future of the economics of Singapore.

References
Articles/Books/ Reports
Chan, David. "The Future of Singapore's Ageing Population: Ageing as Asset and Adaptation."
(2016) SINGAPORE 2065: Leading Insights on Economy and Environment from 50 Singapore
Icons and Beyond. 39-44.
Kuah, Khun Eng. "Singapore State and the Emergence of Buddhist Welfarism." (2016) 41(4)
Ageing International 335-349.
McLaren, John, Allan Yeo, and Michael Sweet. "Australia is facing a housing affordability
crisis: Is the solution to this problem the Singapore model of housing?." (2016) 10(4)
Australasian Accounting, Business and Finance Journal 38-57.
Others
Al-Hdabi, Abbas. "Laboratory investigation on the properties of asphalt concrete mixture with
Rice Husk Ash as filler." (2016) 126(2) Construction and Building Materials 544-551.
Chong, Siow Ann, et al. "A population-based survey of mental disorders in Singapore." (2017)
19(3) Singapore Ageing economic review
Guo, Feng, et al. "The effects of age on crash risk associated with driver distraction." (2017)
46(1) International journal of epidemiology 258-265.
Lim, See Ming, and Sin Eng Chia. "The prevalence of fatigue and associated health and safety
risk factors among taxi drivers in Singapore." (2015) 56(2) Singapore medical journal
Nagarajan, Renuga, Aurora AC Teixeira, and Sandra Silva. "The impact of population ageing on
economic growth: a bibliometric survey." (2017) 62(2) The Singapore Economic Review 275-
296.
Picco, Louisa, et al. "Economic burden of multimorbidity among older adults: impact on
healthcare and societal costs." (2016) 16(1) BMC health services research 173.

Tan, Augustine. "Economic prospects of Singapore." (2016)17(3).SINGAPORE 2065: Leading
Insights on Economy and Environment from 50 Singapore Icons and Beyond. 213-218.
Wei, Kai, et al. "Frailty and malnutrition: related and distinct syndrome prevalence and
association among community-dwelling older adults: Singapore Longitudinal Ageing
Studies." (2017) 18(12) Journal of the American Medical Directors Association 1019-1028.
Wu, Tianqing, et al. "Experimental Study of Ageing Effect in Pool Boiling Heat Transfer." (2018) 2(1) IEEE
20th Electronics Packaging Technology Conference (EPTC). IEEE,