TR EMERITUS

At the beginning of this year, PM Lee gave a New Year message that claimed the economic outlook for this year 2019 will be good for Singapore. I had to rebut him, saying there were dark clouds looming ahead because the trade war between the US and China were creating great uncertainties. As a small open economy which depends... 

Coming right after the awful GDP figures for the second quarter (see Hey Lee Hsien Loong Dude, What’s the Plan?), the trade figures announced by Enterprise Singapore on 17 July were equally, if not more, shocking. Non-oil domestic exports (NODX) fell by 17.3% year-on-year in June, an acceleration from the 16.3% decline in... 

On the same day I read about Singapore’s declining birth rate The number of babies born here last year fell to an eight-year low, posing more demographic challenges for an ageing population. The Report on Registration of Births and Deaths 2018 said 39,039 births were registered last year, a 1.5 per cent drop from 2017. I read...