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Ethos Issue 1, October 2006
Ageing Repositioned: Singapore
in the New Global Demography
Sarah Harper
Given the steadily increasing health profiles
of this population, there are clearly policy options toward
extending working lives. Compounding the policy challenge,
however, is the myth that older people aged 50 years upwards
are unproductive and potential burdens on society because
they are less able to perform modern economic activities than
those younger. Yet evidence with current generations shows
that while there is some decline in mental and physical capacity
between age 50 and 70, there is little decline that cannot
be compensated for by changing the working environment and
working practices. In addition, retaining and retraining older
workers would halt the haemorrhaging of experience from corporations
and industries — a concern associated with increasing
early retirement. Older workers can be as energetic as younger
ones given the right working environments and are, in almost
all cases, more experienced.
With fewer younger people working and consuming,
there is a further concern that economic growth may be slow.
However, if individuals continue to be economically active,
their consumption rates and patterns will change and not necessarily
decrease. Currently, those over 50 years spend on leisure
activities rather than on consumable goods. If they remain
within the labour force throughout their 60s, later life income
is more likely to be spent on household consumable goods.
For example, consumer goods purchased in their 20s and 30s
will need replacing. Already key marketing and consumer organisations
are beginning to realise this and are capitalising on new
market potentials. Traditional perceptions of older cohorts
and their patterns of behaviour will need to change.
As the recent HSBC Future of Retirement
Survey7
shows, Singaporeans, like their other Asian counterparts,
look forward to a happy and healthy retirement, and one in
which active, economically productive work plays a part. They
are also realistic: two-thirds believe they should bear the
financial costs of their own retirement. Unlike other populations,
who favour increased lifetime savings to fund retirement,
Singaporeans wish to work longer in order to finance their
own old age. Their potential working environment is promising
too. In the HSBC survey, over 90% of Singaporean employers
surveyed said their older workers were as loyal and reliable
as younger ones, and three-quarters saw them as at least as
productive, saying they tried to encourage them to remain
in the workplace. Over half felt that early retirement meant
a loss to their workplace of valuable skills and knowledge.
The Singapore Government is clearly aware
of its impending demographic shift and is ahead of many Asian
governments in putting in place early policy initiatives which
may address these issues. What is less well understood, however,
is how large changes in national age distributions will affect
wider economic issues such as national saving patterns, capital
requirements and international capital flows, particularly
between the developed, and the transitional and less developed
economies.
Yet Singapore need not fear its future
demography. The population of Singapore seems realistic about
its long-term demographic futures; its employers are willing
to retain and retrain older workers. It is not so much heading
into a world of older people, but into a world where Singaporeans
simply live longer — and wish to remain healthy, active
individuals throughout their new long lives.
Dr Sarah Harper is Director of The
Oxford Institute of Ageing at the University of Oxford. She
is lead investigator on the Ageing Workforce Programme and
the Impact of Migration on Families Programme. She has also
completed a recent study on Extending Late Life Work, and
a collaborative six-country study on grandparenthood across
Western Europe, funded by the European Union.
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