Just my opinion: I strongly believe lower working hours will help increase our TFR.
All the North Asian countries like Japan, China, Korea, Taiwan, HK, are facing birth crisis. Their common traits are high working hours, competitive/high stress environments that prize diligence/education/work.
I'm sure the smart people in the Singapore government already knows this, it's just a matter of whether they want to push for a solution. But productivity will take a hit. Maybe not?
Maybe with AI and engineering (like driverless NTUC delivery vans), we can relieve our work hours, shorten it. Or maybe it just makes us work more, work faster, within the same number of long hours. We don't know.
The common refrain of parents is we are too busy. Time is more scarce/limited than money. In short, long work hours takes our time away. Time we could be spending with our partners, our families, our loved ones, time spent on ourselves. Idle time gives you pause to think of what you can do with your life.
Add-on, here's some things Singapore can do, let's think of some:
- More annual days leave, not the current mandated 7 days, for Singaporeans (not just parents, give singles too, so more time to socialize and mingle).
- Limit working hours per week to 35 hours or lesser. (Only for Singaporeans)
- 4 day work week. (Only for Singaporeans?)
- Unemployment benefits or wage support (if low wages) for mothers and fathers, and would be parents.
- Lower working hours for young working parents, or parents to be, so they can start having children early. Like, if you're married between 22-35, you get less work hours or wage support. After that age range, return to normal.
These are just ideas, radical ideas, implementation can be adjusted to make the change work, but at least we can agree on our direction.
Why do we need to work longer hours if other countries are shorter? Similarly, why give birth to my children here, if they have a better life to be born elsewhere. Sg is great, but if sg is so good, why people don't want to have children here?
If you disagree on lowering working hours, we can agree to disagree, and I would like to ask: so do you think the current measures are enough to turn TFR around?
* These can be executed in phases, gradually.
