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And comments with the top "likes" many I would gladly cast my vote for.
Adriel Leong Many knows that at PMET and below level, you are doomed to be replaced. The issue is never about giving birth but raising a child.
This is also anti SME as manpower is already an issue.
Another doomed policy if ever implemented. The govt should think about pro family and not pro birth policies.
Yelen Zeng Yan Ling How about waive off the maid levy and has a 'normal' 9-5 working hour, so parent have more quantity and quality time with their children? It's a pitty if you have more babies in this country, but parent's are not at home to raise them.
Susan Choo That means no work for about a year. Some companies may be putting off employing female staffs.
Rohaya Ummu Nashwan
Sounds rather good but i guess juz stick to 4mths. Why? Cos more women will be in a vulnerable position at their workplace, and they might lose out to their colleagues in terms of promotion and competitveness. Employers will not favour this move and will seek to employ more men and ended up more women will lose opportunity for employment.
Better to implement the following:
1) Decrease the Maid's levy;
2) More subsidies for child care fees;
3) Flexible working hrs but stick to de 8hrs wrkng hrs routine say u offcially have to report for work @9am and ends @6pm. But give flexible hrs for working mums/dads eg 10-7pm, or 8-5 and etc;
4) Increase CCL to at least 10days.
5) Extend pick-up time at child care ctr. Most CCC implement de before 7pm pick-up rule. This can be very rushing for wrkng mums/dads to fetch their kids.
6) Make paternity mandatory to at least 1mth. Daddies have to play a part in raising a child. This will also deter employers to seek more men for employement cos this will increase a fair level playing field. Remember de campaign "Dads for life";
7) More subside for babies/children medical check-ups and vaccinations. Include more medisave usage.
8) Govt inject more $$$ into de edufunds for children education.
9) More subside or better still FOC textbooks and abolish school fees for up to secondary level (for Spore citizen only).
Did i leave anything else unwritten?
Daphne Tan 6 months leaves will not help working moms. It will only deter employers from employing ladies who are expected to be young mothers. If I'm a boss, I'll avoid employing such ladies!
Boosting birth rate is all about money and space. Infant care and child care centers are charging way too expensive here and maids are unreliable. Grandparents have to work as they can't retire. HDB home is too small to accommodate another kid. Too many factors involve.
We have always solve our dearth of babies problem with easy fixes that do not work. The government finally gave up and make up for all the missing babies of the last 20 to 30 years with massive inflow of foreigners.
It is very simple why the problem could not be overcome. After giving economic growth the top priority, all competing priorities must fight for the left-overs. Defense rank ahead of every priority as can be seen from its budget allocation. Oddly a shrinking population is a security issue as grave and in need of attention as the money spent on the military but it is not getting sufficient resources.
Not that I recommend this as I haven't think this through yet, the scarcity of time and energy on families can be ameliorated with government money. If the state offers to pay for the maternity leave, businesses would be less unwilling to hire women as many have feedback.
We invest heavily in the education and health of each child because each of them have to compete successfully against all others. Naturally you do not want to divide a limited pie among so many children.
At the end of the day the wealth of this nation is produced by its people. Either you leave them with enough to raise more children or government and organizations have to return the money, redistributed to meet national objectives of having more kids. Alternatively our methods of raising kids have to be cheaper and yet not worse than what we are getting now. This is a massive cultural change that cuts across all aspects of our lives especially the family and the workplace. Now near sighted employers are not interested and businesses have a talent of getting free money from governments but not returning in kind. Hence my doubts about throwing money at the problem.
So we are back to remaking Singapore which we had talked too much and loudly about but nothing happens.
An idea just emerged in my mind. May be businesses with employees that have more babies get some tax benefits? Targeted taxes have always been very effective at changing behavior.
ddd
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