0:06

The Singapore of today, the

0:08

one featured in Crazy Rich Asians,

0:11

with its luxury shopping malls, mansions

0:14

and an airport complete with a butterfly garden

0:16

and a movie theater. That's a

0:18

relatively new phenomenon. Less

0:21

than sixty years ago, Singapore was newly

0:23

independent and incredibly poor.

0:26

Three quarters of the city's population lived

0:28

in overcrowded slums without electricity

0:31

or proper sanitation. The

0:33

environment was extremely bad. Just to

0:36

prove it to you, you could actually

0:38

blindfold yourself and you know

0:41

you're at Singapore River. Why

0:44

it could smell in Singapore

0:46

River. That's the Singapore

0:49

we will indose states. That's Low

0:51

Tiker, and he's one of the main reasons

0:53

the city is so different today. People

0:56

call him the architect of modern Singapore.

1:00

Lou always had dreams of bettering his circumstances

1:03

and those of the city he grew up in. At

1:05

a young age, he decided to study architecture

1:08

so he could one day help build up

1:10

Singapore. His studies took him

1:12

to Australia, then Yale, and

1:15

then to New York, where he worked for the famed

1:17

architect I. M. P. Then

1:20

he got the opportunity he had been preparing for

1:23

In nineteen sixty nine, Louis asked to

1:25

come back to Singapore to join its

1:27

recently established Housing Development

1:29

Board, or the HDB. Its

1:31

goal was to improve the city's housing conditions,

1:34

and the Government of Singapore decided,

1:37

if we want to have a sustainable

1:40

city compatible

1:42

with all the other larger countries,

1:46

we must achieve excellence.

1:48

And one of the signs

1:50

of removing backwardness

1:53

is to remove the squats and house

1:56

everybody in housing.

1:59

But it was about more than just putting a decent

2:01

roof over people's heads. Singapore

2:04

is a tiny island state with no agricultural

2:07

industry. Singapore's key resource

2:10

is its people, so the government

2:12

wanted to make Singapore somewhere people wanted

2:14

to live and stay, a place

2:16

they were invested in. When

2:19

you own your own properties,

2:22

then you feel that you have

2:24

taken root in the society. And

2:28

I also want to defend on

2:30

the one to defend for the survival of the

2:32

country. On the hand is to help

2:35

build the economy of the country, and

2:38

it went even further than that. The

2:40

government also felt that if it met

2:42

people's basic needs housing,

2:44

education, health care, then

2:46

they'd be able to thrive and in turn

2:49

help Singapore's economy grow.

2:52

Within a few years, more than four hundred thousand

2:55

people were living in h GB rentals.

2:58

Singapore must be one of the few places is in the

3:00

world where a statutory board satisfactorily

3:02

completed everything is set out to do in its first

3:05

five year plan. Then in

3:07

nineteen sixty four, the government want a step

3:09

further and began to allow to encourage

3:12

even lower middle income citizens

3:14

to buy their apartments at prices well

3:17

below market rates. After

3:19

five years, they could sell them on the open market.

3:22

That program allowed many Singaporeans

3:24

to make a lot of money. If

3:27

you bought an HDB apartment and

3:30

sold it twenty five years later, you'd

3:32

have made your money back more than ten times

3:34

over. Today, Singaporeans

3:37

expect to own their homes. Almost

3:40

of the population does, and eventually

3:42

to sell them at a profit. With

3:44

one sweeping policy, Singapore had managed

3:47

to ensure that the vast majority of its population

3:49

had a clean, modern place to live, and

3:52

it had boosted its economy. Singapore

3:55

is now one of the richest countries per capita

3:58

in the world. Then

4:00

the pandemic ushered in Singapore's worst

4:02

ever recession, and median household

4:05

income fell for the first time in a decade,

4:08

and while Singapore did a pretty good job containing

4:10

the virus, the pandemic brought havoc

4:12

to the city's carefully controlled real estate

4:15

market. The economy

4:17

shrank, but home prices continued to

4:19

rise. The average private property

4:21

now costs about fifteen times median

4:23

household earnings. That's higher than

4:26

New York, London or San Francisco.

4:29

I do worry that nowadays the

4:32

public housing presses is really

4:34

a business venture then actually

4:36

solving the housing need. I

4:39

feel that the implication may not

4:41

be very good for the economic

4:43

development of Singapore. Jobless

4:46

claims coming in, I mean really jumping from

4:49

the week before, pretty brutal, three

4:51

point to a million record

4:53

six point six million Americans filed

4:55

for unemployment last week. Indian

4:57

working women, but the worst impact

5:00

did the pandemic. Prices of

5:02

public housing. We sail flats have hit an

5:04

old time high in the first quarter of the

5:06

year. Well now to the billionaire boom.

5:08

According to Bloomberg, super yacht charters

5:11

are up over three d and

5:14

a billionaire was created every twenty

5:17

six hours during this pandemic. It

5:19

is time for a wealth tax

5:21

in America. Welcome

5:28

back to the paycheck. I'm Rebecca Greenfield.

5:32

By many accounts, Singapore is a pandemic

5:35

and an inequality success story. The

5:37

country kept its COVID death rates relatively

5:40

low, and it's a rich country

5:42

where many people live relatively comfortably.

5:46

But as we've learned this season, no place can

5:48

fully insulate itself from the effects of a

5:50

pandemic, and Singapore felt

5:53

huge economic shocks that have hit its core

5:55

affordable housing super hard. Like

5:58

in many big cities around the world, demand for

6:00

housing spiked during the pandemic. People

6:03

were reevaluating their life choices and

6:06

the homes they were suddenly spending way more time

6:08

in, and they were enjoying record

6:10

low interest rates. As

6:13

a result, Singapore is becoming more and

6:15

more stratified, and that's left

6:17

its citizens starting to question whether the

6:19

city's wildly successful housing experiment

6:22

is still working for them. In the election,

6:25

the ruling People's Action Party suffered

6:27

its worst parliamentary results and more

6:30

than sixty years of unbroken rule.

6:32

Observers blamed the outcome on younger voters,

6:35

and they're growing fears about inequality. They

6:39

worry they can't match the economic advancement

6:41

their parents enjoyed. If the

6:43

problem remains unresolved. Singapore

6:46

is at risk of losing its only resource,

6:49

It's people. My colleague

6:51

Forest Moctar grew up in Singapore and

6:53

has worked as a reporter there for the past ten

6:56

years. Here he is with the story. For

7:05

most people in Singapore, home is

7:08

an HTB apartment like the one

7:10

I'm standing outside right now. I

7:13

grew up in one of these government built units,

7:15

and my parents still live in one today.

7:18

They're usually found in high rise blocks

7:20

on clean tree line streets, and

7:22

the largest are big enough for a family of five

7:24

like mine. The blocks

7:26

look pretty unremarkable to anyone

7:29

familiar with public housing, but

7:31

they have a couple of uniquely Singaporean

7:33

features. Here on the ground

7:36

floor, there's an open sheltered space

7:38

called the Void Deck. It's

7:40

a shady communal gathering place out of the

7:42

equatorial sunshine, and you will sometimes

7:44

even see weddings and funerals

7:47

held here. Inside newer flats,

7:50

you'll often find a built in bomb

7:52

shelter. That's the worst case

7:54

preparation measure, just in case the

7:56

city is ever under attack, but

7:58

mostly they just yet used as extra

8:01

storage space. I have friends

8:03

who is there as walking wardrobes

8:06

or even makeshift wine salist and

8:08

like almost everything in Singapore, HDB

8:11

flats have been meticulously planned.

8:14

I was very and viewers

8:16

of the old cities in the West

8:19

in Europe particularly and also Manhattan.

8:23

That's Liu Tiger again, the architect

8:25

of modern Singapore. So I wanted

8:28

Singapore to be as good as

8:30

those and the second or strain

8:33

as a planner, so I want to make sure that

8:35

Singapore functions well.

8:38

Liu and the HDB agency took into

8:40

account everything from the facilities

8:43

available in each neighborhood to

8:45

even the amount of light that was needed.

8:48

When there's no no good lighting, people

8:50

are in a bad wood and therefore they

8:53

tend to fight more. So all this

8:55

things have been built into the

8:57

hardware from the get go. The

9:00

founding leaders of Singapore determined

9:02

that housing and home ownership would

9:04

be one of the city state's core payless

9:07

and for their kids it has been.

9:10

But as prices keep going up, not

9:12

everyone is convinced the government's

9:14

plan is still working for everyone. Obviously,

9:17

people need a place to live, right, they desire

9:21

good places, high quality places to live,

9:23

but they should focus on it as a

9:26

good, not an asset. That's

9:29

Christopher g He's a senior researcher

9:32

at a Singapore think tank called the Institute

9:34

of Policy Studies has been looking

9:36

at the city's approach to housing for the last

9:39

decade. If you encourage

9:41

that idea that it is an asset and

9:44

people can speculate to grow wealthy, then

9:47

it kind almost ends up in

9:49

as your some game. But if people think a plant,

9:52

this is a good right, then we do

9:54

get good out of it. It's for your consumption.

9:57

You should buy it, utilize

10:00

it for what it is worth

10:02

to you, not to think that, okay,

10:04

you can flog it onto somebody else at a higher

10:07

price. What he's saying is that increasing

10:09

property prices are a zero sum

10:12

game because it would be buyas lose

10:14

out, even as existing homeowners

10:16

see their wealth grow. In

10:19

other words, the system can lead to inequality,

10:22

and Singapore's government worries about

10:24

inequality, which can have a corrosive

10:27

effect on social cohesion and

10:29

can even drive social unrest.

10:32

Inequality is an issue

10:34

that affects people's trust

10:37

in each other. If there is a big

10:39

difference in someone's lived experience,

10:41

someone's opportunities, it's

10:43

harder for you to understand and

10:46

put yourself into the position of the other. It

10:48

also strikes into the social compact. It

10:51

strikes against the Singapole pledge

10:53

right. We pledge ourselves to developer

10:56

adjusting equal society, and

10:58

I think if we don't hold that, then

11:00

there's something problematic. Singapore's

11:17

reaches residents wouldn't blink at

11:19

sucking out millions for a new pad, but

11:22

soaring property prices, even

11:24

for government built apartments, have become

11:27

a real concern for many ordinary people.

11:30

Even a relatively simple

11:32

four bedroom public unit can go for more

11:34

than four hundred thousand Singapore dollars,

11:37

which is about two D nine U

11:40

S dollars. An apartment in a prime

11:42

location can fetch more than three

11:44

times that amount, and in Singapore's

11:47

carefully planned housing market, things

11:49

are even more complicated. For younger

11:52

would be biased under thirty

11:54

five don't qualify for subsidized

11:56

HDB apartments known as

11:58

built to order units or b t o

12:01

s unless they are married. Abishak

12:04

Rabbi Christian is one of those ordinary

12:06

Singaportians who's worried by rising

12:08

prices. I think it's a huge

12:11

problem the affordability. It's public housing,

12:13

after all, but it doesn't match up to

12:15

the price. What you're paying for it's

12:17

not the paying field, but when public housing

12:19

is meant to be more accessible to the public, so

12:21

affordability is definitely a huge

12:23

issue for me personally. Other

12:26

Shack is thirty three years old, a young professional

12:29

who doesn't yet have a family to worry about.

12:31

It's a long way from the bottom of singapore

12:34

social economic ladder. Even so,

12:36

his hopes of buying a property as an

12:38

investment are dimming. We've

12:41

all grown up with their mindset. But to

12:43

me, I think exchanged over time after seeing

12:46

what's happened, especially with the increased

12:48

prices of public housing, which I essentially

12:51

meant for the public, but the prices

12:53

have gone up because you're allowed to flip

12:55

it around. Obviously, property can be

12:57

an asset, but for some

13:00

one whose middle income or lower

13:02

mill income, I don't think it's a viable

13:04

means of profity. Abishay

13:06

is well aware of the benefits that the country

13:08

has already seen as a result of these

13:11

policies, but he's also resigned

13:13

to the fact that he's unlikely to experience

13:16

the same social uplift as previous

13:18

generations have enjoyed. At

13:20

that point. The seventies and eighties

13:23

decisions will meet with that generation

13:25

in mind and how to move them forward.

13:27

And obviously it's helped singapore development

13:30

and growth over the last forty years has

13:32

been phenomenal, so I don't think there's resentment

13:34

to it. But right now the middle

13:36

incomes getting squashed because it's

13:38

very difficult to break out of that cycle. The

13:40

pandemic showed Abish just how deep

13:43

the divide between rich and poor can

13:45

be. For him, the real question

13:48

is not just how Singapore managers is housing

13:50

supply, it's whether everyday

13:52

people still have the opportunity to thrive.

13:55

I questioned the level of meritocracy.

13:58

I've always questioned it, but because obviously

14:01

we're living in the real world where connections, knowing

14:03

people having strong networks, having

14:06

come from different backgrounds, or

14:08

having your background might determine where you're gonna

14:11

end up. So I don't personally

14:13

believe that Singapore is society

14:15

that's based completely on meritocracy. For

14:17

me, personally, housing is I

14:20

want to build a home for myself and a

14:22

place where I can come back to and I

14:24

feel a sense of belonging, So not

14:26

only the actual property itself,

14:29

but the surroundings as well. And that's

14:31

a bit idealistic. On my part, but

14:34

it has to be a place that means something to me, like

14:36

carb shaped. Julian too, is in

14:38

her early thirties with the career

14:41

and no family yet. COVID

14:43

was one of the forces that prompted her to think

14:46

about buying her own home. With

14:48

the pandemic, it was a catalyst

14:51

for a lot of people like myself to move out

14:53

of their parental homes, and from

14:55

there actually realized that I really

14:57

enjoy living on my own. I really

15:00

wanted to have a place that I could

15:02

do it myself and really call a

15:05

home of my own, rather than her sprinting.

15:07

Even though she got some help from her

15:09

parents to make the purchase, surging

15:12

prices were still a consideration. If

15:14

I wasn't fortunate enough to her parents who

15:16

were able to help me, I would have to wait

15:19

until a thirty five to buy an HDB and

15:21

that's just just as really unfortunate,

15:24

right. She's still confident that she will make

15:26

a profit on her purchase eventually,

15:29

though a smaller one than previous generations

15:32

could have expected. So my parents

15:34

they were able to nine

15:37

x their original investment in the house.

15:40

My sister about ten eleven

15:42

years ago, she was able to double it, and

15:45

I'm seeing that decrease over

15:47

time. For sure. Personally, I would

15:49

see it as a home and a long term assat.

15:52

I have a couple of friends who have bought

15:54

b t O s and they're hoping to flip it up

15:57

after five to six years. I'm not

15:59

looking to do that sort of flipping, not

16:01

at least for the next eight to ten years.

16:04

I think it's all about the horizon that

16:06

you have in mind. I do think that it

16:08

will so be profitable and houses

16:10

will only continue to go up in price.

16:13

Joline's views aren't unusual. As

16:16

long as housing behaves like an investment

16:18

asset, it's all but inevitable

16:21

that many people will continue to treat it

16:23

like one. But whether

16:25

you see housing as an investment like

16:28

Joline or as more of a consumer

16:30

good like Abishaik, affordability

16:33

is an issue that's hard to ignore. It's

16:36

an issue I'm very familiar with myself.

16:39

I'm thirty three years old, and in twenty

16:41

twenty I did start thinking about purchasing

16:43

my first property. To my surprise,

16:46

prices skyrocketed despite

16:49

the pandemic and the recession. I

16:51

abandoned my plans, and I wonder

16:54

now whether I missed the boat. When

16:56

my parents sold our five bed fled in two

16:59

thousand and one, we moved into a smaller

17:01

unit, and they made a big enough profit

17:03

to buy the latest Nissan and to

17:05

top up their savings account too. I

17:08

know that kind of return is

17:10

a way out of reach for me now. I

17:13

get asked every now and then do

17:15

I plan to buy an apartment. I'm

17:18

too young to get an HDB as an unmarried

17:21

person, and I'm not going to get

17:23

married just so I can buy one. Finding

17:26

a girlfriend is a long enough

17:28

process. Rising housing

17:31

prices also scare me. Let's

17:33

say, if my future wife wants to buy

17:35

a home, maybe we'll do it. If

17:37

I'm on my own, I might stick with renting

17:40

and put my capital into stocks, cryptocurrency

17:43

or are the investments. When

17:50

I reached out to the National Development Ministry

17:53

to comment for this story, a

17:55

spokesperson said that HTB flats

17:57

are primarily intended as a home

17:59

for their owners to live in, as

18:01

well as being a good store value for

18:04

the owner's retirement. That's

18:07

in line with the ruling party's message about

18:09

the property market. Since it faced

18:11

unhappy voters during the first year

18:14

of the pandemic well. The ruling

18:16

People's Action Party has won every

18:18

election since independence, and

18:21

opposition politicians say the city's

18:23

election rules make it very hard for anyone

18:26

else to win. The government is

18:28

still very sensitive to signs that its

18:30

popularity is slipping. About

18:33

six months ago, it rolled out title

18:35

loan limits and additional property taxes

18:38

on second homes, the latest

18:40

of several rounds of measures designed

18:42

to cool house prices. It also

18:44

announced it will increase the supply of

18:46

housing, but it may

18:48

well take more than these measures to change

18:51

singaporeans attitudes to real estate.

18:54

Paul Tumbaya, who is chairman of the opposition

18:56

Singapore Democratic Party, says

18:58

it's high time property was handled

19:01

more like a consumer good. Again, housing

19:03

does not actually enable anybody to move up

19:06

the social letter unless you have a rich father

19:09

or mother. The vast majority of Singapore

19:11

is more than eight percent of them own only a single

19:13

property, the one in which they live. So

19:16

sure, if the value of this property rises,

19:18

they could be tremendously wealthy if they sell

19:20

the property, But then where are they going to live? The

19:23

original goals of public housing in Singapore

19:26

were very good and very noble. The idea

19:28

is that you provide a safe roof over

19:30

people's head, You provide them with

19:32

electricity, with clean water, and

19:35

so they can use their savings for

19:37

other things, for other far more productive

19:39

investments. So I think that's where housing

19:41

needs to go back to to provide for

19:43

a roof over the heads of the bulk of the population

19:47

is calling for an overhaul of the city's

19:49

housing model. In the early days,

19:51

you could only sell your HDB flat back

19:53

to the HDB and then the government

19:55

will put it into the general pool

19:58

of property that's available and then somebody

20:00

could buy it after that. This would be too drastic

20:02

a step to put in it one fell swoop. So

20:05

we've suggested that a certain portion of the housing

20:07

stopped being non open market, so

20:10

there would be open market flights which could

20:12

be sold on the open market, and the non open

20:14

market flights which would have to go back to the

20:17

HDB. And it's it's

20:19

not going to be easy and people are going to

20:21

have to come to terms with the idea of flipping

20:23

property is not the solution, but I think that's

20:26

more realistic. Paul's ideas aren't

20:29

the only ones in the mix right now. Well,

20:31

Singapore grapples with keeping housing affordable.

20:34

Some observers even suggest Singapore

20:37

should move away from its home ownership

20:39

model and instead encourage

20:41

renting, which is more common in

20:43

places like Germany or Japan. The

20:46

pandemic force people around the world

20:48

to think hard about how and where

20:50

they were living. In Singapore,

20:53

where home ownership has become a cornerstone

20:55

of national identity and a key

20:57

indicator of well being. It

21:00

wrought simmering concerns about wealth disparity

21:02

to the foe for young people,

21:04

in particular, calls for

21:07

housing to be treated as a good and

21:09

not an investment asset. Maybe

21:11

a signal that Singapore's original

21:13

housing experiment is getting closer

21:16

to having run its course. It's

21:18

the success story that our parents generation

21:21

have been able to use

21:23

to upgrade themselves. So

21:25

it's hard and for the government to now do

21:28

a reverse you turn and say that you know, we're

21:30

going to shift to a different model, it would

21:32

be very difficult and perhaps politically

21:35

unpopular. People are going to be upset,

21:38

right, but I think they can get over it. They

21:41

can't be their parents. I don't think they want to be their

21:43

parents. Singapore

21:53

shows that a country can drastically change

21:55

its economic fortunes. It can

21:57

also just as easily backslide. It

22:00

takes the right mix of policies, interventions,

22:03

and resources, but poverty

22:05

and inequality are not foregone

22:07

conclusions. Next

22:10

week, on our final episode of this season

22:13

of The Paycheck, we had to a utopia

22:15

of economic equality to see

22:17

if there are lessons to be learned for the rest

22:20

of the world. The objective

22:22

of the cooperative is not to produce rich

22:25

people, is to produce rich societies.

22:27

At the end of the day, even if you are

22:29

not rich, if you belong to a rich

22:31

society, you will be happy. Thanks

22:33

for listening to The Paycheck. This episode

22:35

originally said that Singapore has no manufacturing

22:38

sector. We've corrected the error

22:41

as the category now accounts for of

22:43

its GDP. If you like our show,

22:45

please head on over to Apple Podcasts or

22:47

wherever you listen to podcasts to rate,

22:49

review and subscribe. This episode

22:52

was hosted by Me Rebecca Greenfield and

22:54

reported by Forest mock Tar. It

22:57

was edited by Ellis McDonald and Janet

22:59

Paskin, with help from Francesca Levi, Racksheta

23:01

Soluja and me. We also

23:04

had editing help from Daniel Balby, Shelley

23:06

Banjo, Christin B. Brown, Gilda

23:08

to Carly, Nicole Flato, and Kai Schultz.

23:11

This episode was produced by Gilda to Carly and

23:13

sound engineered by Matt kim Our.

23:16

Original music is by Leo Sidron. Special

23:19

thanks to Magnus Hendrickson, We Get Into

23:21

Kayper, Margaret Sutherland, and Stacy

23:23

Wong. Francesca Levi is Bloomberg's

23:26

Head of Podcasts. See you next week.