Do we need to resort to matchmaking to increase birth rate?

Question

In the Mandarin National Day Rally speech, PM Lee said that the Chinese community had a very low total fertility rate (TFR) of 1.14. He suggested that maybe People's Association could consider organising Parental Matchmaking Sessions so that parents can find suitable partners for their single children. What do you think?

Answer 1

My 2 cents of thoughts on this subject. Personally, I find to increase fertility rate to go this extra mile, is not going to increase the statistic.

Baby do bring joy to the family yet at the same time followed by myriad challenges.  To have more jewels of course is a blessing but in this time of everything goes 'up, up, up' not down.  Some might beg to differ that older times, our parents can afford to have at least a dozen when our mother is a homemaker waiting bacon on the table by our father.  Times changed!  Nowadays when you goes marketing with say $50.00 - you get limited stuff.

In my humble opinion, in this millennium era, some children will not let allow parents to find suitable partners for them.  Well, there are some filial ones will let parents to determine their happines.

To resort of increasing the national rate, the government is considering organing Parental M atchmaking Sessions - it is too premature as to whether its going to success - only times will give us the answers.

Answer 2

No way! What's good for he parents may not be good for their children. Even if it gets past the stage of getting married, it still does not solve the problem of low fertility rate.

Having children should be an joy, not an obligations. The government can however help facilitate an encouraging environment for couples to have children:

1) Make delivery free

2) From infant to toddler (0-2) free medical care. (this is one of the reason couple does not want to have children)

3) Launch family/company social networking campaigns.

(it is not the amount of leave one can take, but a supporting working environment that permits it)

Incentives/bonus are good, but not detrimental in promoting fertility rates, if bonus are good it would had worked long time ago (unless we are talking about big amount or during desperate times). Baby bonus/incentives are only good for some time and are limited (the same for government packages like NSS), sooner or later people will realise that..

Answer 3

Maybe..theres quite a lot of number of singaporeans remained single. Maybe when more people get married, the birth rate might increase a little but not a lot. Singapore government should consider our difficulties like high cost of living. But maybe high cost of living is not a real problem afterall.. During our grandmother time, they can afford to have alot of children even though they have finciancial problem. If Singapore is really that desperate to increase birth rate, singapore can just force us to have a child and married by a certain age. Well i personally think that maybe singapore can introduce new incentives to company to impose happy hour so that this allows that employees to mingle with each other more rather than keep focusing on their career?

Its not easy to increase birth rate tho...good luck singapore.

Answer 4

Match-making is a good idea. parents who are blessed with maternal instincts somehow are like a light-detector or scanner. They are able to study the tell tale signs that their children usually miss out. So not only are parents able to find a spouse for their children but one of good and sound character. Our young ones are in the pursuit of chasing 'paper" and 'money' and in the process 'miss the boat' to real and meaningful life. Most of them end up on the shelves the rest marry late when they seem to be less fertile and less romantic. What makes things worse is the current soaring smoking and drinking habit that partially kills the sexual urge between married couples. So this slows the birth rate. So early and timely intervention of parents finding suitable and compatible spouse for their children will help help increase the birth rate and moreover with the total consent and blessings of parents for the couples they take delight in will decrease the divorce rate too.

Answer 5

Isn't that going back to hundreds of years back when childrens have no rights of say over maritial affairs? Low birth rates are a signs so problems in the society, as our society progress the costs of time becomes more and more expensive. Individuals lack of social relations do not have the access to social networks tends to marry later with fewer kids. Social development unit(SDU) should open its doors to and omit the high membership fees so as to encourage more people to join and interact to improve on the chances of finding a partner.  

The government should also reduce taxs and implement a form of salary handbook or guide line to revise the wages of singaporeans so as to prevent exploitations from capitalistic organisations.

Answer 6

i don't think 'YAHOO MINISTER' answer the question correctly. this is sour-graping, for foreign workers who are more talented than he is.  i am singaporean as well, by the way.  going back to the question, i don't think Parental Matchmaking is not the solution to the dying population of Singapore, maybe the answer will be the changing of the mindset of the 'would-be' parents. they should start thinking the advantage of starting a family, by having children. government should give more incentives to childrens educational needs.

Answer 7

I think it's a cool idea. There are singles out there who would like to procreate, but many do not even have a serious boyfriend. At least the government can target these people to help increase the birth rate once they get married, and leave some married couples who do not want to give birth(like me and my hubby) alone?  

Answer 8

Getting married is certainly a joyous matter. It is the beginning of a new journey.Get married and set-up a family looks simple.PM Lee suggests a simple equation. Matchmaking=Marriage=Multiplication; but many stop at 2. 2 for husband and wife or 2 kids. His team of experts understand the formula has many odds.Chinese in Singapore has high expectation, needs higher assurance and  worry of lifestyle changes. The society changes and it cannot be reverted.The government foresee a grave problem. A mild solution to lead out another one is the key of this desperate move. A variable move shall divert a downtrend situation.

Move this move first, Mr.Lee and watch the change.

Answer 9

Absolutely not.  It looks like our leaders are turning a blind eye to the real issue at hand.  That is, the ever-growing living standards in Singapore and the never-growing salaries of S'poreans.  Getting married and having a family is a costly affair - the payment starts from the day the couple start on their plans for a wedding, house and subsequently a family.

Parents in one-child families are too busy trying to make both ends meet while at the same time trying to provide a better life for their child to have time to consider having a 2nd child.  Like what most of my friends said, 'we're certainly not having a 2nd one when our 1st one is already making us work until face green green.'

The issue here is not perhaps the low fertility rate, but it's actually the points leading to it.

Ever increasing cost of living  = can't afford to have a kid when we're struggling ourselves.

Perhaps our ministers should address this issue rather then bringing in matchmaking to low fertility rate.   Perhaps the government should realize that it can do better then just giving out sums of money to citizens 'to help them cope with the recession' and 'a baby bonus'.

I can hardly call Singapore my home now when most of the time I ended up paying for bills and taxes.  Perhaps this is something our government should look into - the reason for our reluctance of having children or a 2nd child could be due to the fact that it's reasonably costly affair to be able to live comfortably with your kids.  Even more so when you're in the middle income group.

Answer 10

Different people will have different say. Most of us will probably disagree with this method as Parental Matchmaking after all might do little to help in increasing fertility rate but a fact remains clear, we cannot deny that it may just be one of the ways for couples to get hitched in an indirect manner.

'Resort' shouldn't be the word, it makes people feel that Matchmaking is a disgraceful thing. But Im sure most of us would have read the papers reporting that more people are beginning to sought modern Matchmaking agencies for help.  Love is something that the society is beginning to lose touch of, let alone true love and happily ever after. But those who experienced it sweetly before or are still having it will certainly not regret having it once again.

yes, 1.14 is considered low. But if 80 to 90% of the community is contributing , im sure it will not be. Families don't have to have many children, it is the total effort of the community that counts.

Once again, for those who seek match making assistance, do not feel shy or disgraceful about it. If you really find happiness from it, who are those to comment about it?!

Answer 11

Just this morning, I was thinking to myself if I'll be comfortable surrounded by more and more non-chinese.  Not being racist here.  This is just so so sensitive in this little island of ours, so I'm not going there. :P

Anyway, back to the question. My take? Matchmaking will not increase birth rate.  It MIGHT increase the number of marriages but not necessary births.  I look at matchmaking as just another avenue for adults of marriageable age to meet and see if they can click.  Ultimately, it's finding LOVE.

Hey! I would LOVE to settle down, have a few kids... but man... it is so tough to just find the RIGHT one.  You see?  That's the real problem.

Maybe the govt should give some sweet treats to cupid so that little cupid can work harder huh? ;)

Answer 12

OLder parents will not attend. The more modern ones will let their children decide their on future. Don't think it will make much difference.

Have to say that the low fertility rate is really due to people becoming more career minded to chase the high level of standards in Singapore. U will be left behind if you choose not to. I'm a divorcee with a kid, i'm still looking out a start another family, but due to work, the social circle becomes small. I have a group of female friends, mostly single or divorcee, all want to start a family but either can't get the right guys coz the social circle is also small & not much time after work to get to know people. THis is 1 group of people whom the government should look into to help. there are people who want to start a family, already financially stable, but they do not have the chance. Some single lady friends even thinking of being a single mother, they want the child but not the Biological father as they have no faith in man. But we all know our society does not support this. There will be great pressure on them.

The ends of the circle does not meet in our case among the ladies single friends.

We all want kids but no partner..

Sigh...

Answer 13

I don't think this works. It's really awkward to have our parents arranged matchmaking sessions for us. We have passed that era.

Seriously, I think the pace of life in Singapore is driving us crazy. Many of my single friends are still unmarried because they really don't have time to go dating. The work pressure and demand is just too great . Often, they are doing more than one person's job with constant downsizing (it becomes a trend rather than an actual need)  in their companies.

I am married with a child but my husband & I do not intend to have a second one coz the cost of living is high. We don't want to be paying debts (HDB loan, education loan, etc) till retirement. Secondly, we hardly have time for our child because of the demand at work. Why give birth and dump the child at the childcare centre? Where's family life for such children?   What values are they picking up and what message are we sending them?Some of my friends are having one kid or none for the same reason. I have worked in a government agency before, trying out on a  part-time work scheme after giving birth. The pay was cut but not the work and responsibilities. In the end, I quit.

A couple of friends have migrated overseas and have given birth to their 2nd and 3rd child there. They are all married to Singaporean man, not foreigners. They are graduates and have become full-time mothers. They like the slower pace of life overseas which give them more family time although the cost of living may not be lower. In fact, we are also thinking of relocating so that our child could have a better life and be appreciated for his talents and not just academic achievements.

Seriously, we need to have better work-life policies in Singapore!

Answer 14

There is this one guy that made a comparison by comparing the attitude of singaporean couples  toward procreating to those couples living in the less developed countries in Asia such as Malaysia, Vietnam, China, Indonesia, that Singaporeans tend to wait and "want to make sure" that they can provide enough for the new borns and also still have enough in the end to continue their life style, while the couples living in those 3rd world country, even they could barely put 3 meals a day, they still put priority toward marriage and "procreating".

Me, myself have been growing up, studying, living and working in a few countries. So let me tell u that this guy that did this comparison is an idiot. Let me explain it in the simplest sense

1. The average people living in those 3rd world countries, are less educated than people living in Singapore (being one of the most developed countries). So, the less educated you are, the more simplistic you will think. While if you are better educated, it is natural for u to have a better planning toward your future, career, finances.

Some of those families living in the 3rd world countries, the poorer they are, the younger they get married, the more children they have. some women sometimes got married at the age of just barely 20, and by the time these women hit late 20s, some of them will have 3 or 4 kids already. AND guess what? in most cases, all the kids will have a lack of education as well.

This is just a simple phenomenon that u can observe without needing much intelligence. Dooh!

2. Most of the people in the 3rd world country, especially those living in a Muslim community, especially for the woman, do not have much choices to voice out their opinion. Having lack of education, and no channels to protect them, and society is still taking control over their  life, you just let things take control over you. Even when their husband decided to take the 2nd wife or having another mistress.

In such less developed places, the men having the "luxury of taking up more than 1 wife, not necesarilly doing well financially. The wives still need to do part time job such as washing, taking chores, etc etc. Why r they willing to just accept their fate? coz they live in the 3rd world country that's all I can say.

So the guy's argument is totally idiotic!!

Problems of low birth rate has always been a problem in all developed countries. Probably can try some measures to balance up work and life, and also FREE medical care for pregnant women up to delivering babies as well as child care center till the age of school. Can try to adopt the chinese (mainland) system. The child to stay at school from morning till around 5 or 6. (the parents can pick the kids up after work).  

Free maternity leave at the expense of companies is definitely a WRONG move. The government going to make it difficult for women (child bearing age) as companies would tend to not hire women seeing them as a financial burden. In the U.S., the government sponsor the maternity leave for 3 months, not the companies.

Singapore P.M. is clearly not a very smart guy listening to his speech :( Quote: If I can change nappies, everbody can do it. Dooh!!! Please come out with a better speech man! The solution to increase birth rate is more complex than just changing nappies!!

Answer 15

No. Matchmaking will not restore Birthrate. There are actually alot of people out there who are already attached but yet to get married. Match making is only able to widen our social with friends. But how many of these couple will have happy lasting relationship. I worried it will lead to increase number of divorced cases. Nowadays getting married, buying a house and child-bearing cost a bomb. Government give baby bonus and incentive only when the child is born. But how's about child bearing and buying a house? Government should help from the child-bearing period as well in order to increase the birth rate.

Answer 16

Just an opinion. No. I think it's the culture of work in the private sector that you must work late or lose your competitiveness against single workers that makes people feel like they will either have no time, or that it doesn't go well with chasing a career. And prevents singles from converting to married relationships. An efficient worker can finish his work by 5 or 6pm, but stays because it is the culture to do so. This is not a staff culture by the way, it's an employer instilled culture.  The theory of working smart, is the theory of showing your boss how late you work, and of course bosses like that because they feel they are getting they're monies worth, and more from late staying staff.

By ending work late, we have less time to go on dates, and couples (with the potential to get married and have kids) argue over not being able to spend enough time with each other. Often just once a week. Through the natural process of love, and time to spend on oneself (personal space) during the evenings of week days and all of the weekends, people can be more satisfied in relationships and their off work goals.

You can match make, but they won't married right away, they have to date. And then they find oh, my boyfriend doesn't spend enough time with me, I only see him once a week. And the boy says I only have two days out of the weekend, I must spend at least one day on myself, and my "personal space", i.e. hobbies like soccer, maybe video games, go out with friends from school days, etc.

Answer 17

Disagree. The standards of  living and costs in Singapore are higher than the other countries which is stressful. Singaporeans are trying to save every cents before they could jump in the world of "Marriage".But before they could save enough to get married,they slowly loses the interest in "Marriage".Therefore the decrease in birth rate.

Answer 18

To a certain extent, this may not work. This is because finding a suitable partner and living together are a separate matter! If we are to organise parental matchmaking sessions, some parents would be faster to make the decision for their children, instead of the children who are supposed to.

I think the root of the problem of not getting married is not only i.e spenting more time in career, lacking the time to meet the opposite/others, it is the personality, character, set of values and habits that the person has, becomes the obstacle of attraction and in relationship.

In order to attract,  we must fulfil each other basic needs as well as other higher level of needs. We know that more singapore women in todays modern society are more independent, pampered and ambitious.They may have the money, car and career already. Some singapore women might have a sense of fear marrying the wrong partner and losing everything they once have.

Liking someone and living with him/her are a separate matter. After marriage, there must a lot of compromising, acceptance and forgiveness. It is not easy.    

Answer 19

There is probably a correlation between getting married and increased birth rate of the nation. But alas, in the case of Spore, what really completes the equation is the variable of cost of living. With this variable, the correlation is no longer so strong. Factors that citizens take into consideration are cost of rearing up babies, of housing, of personal expenses. This increasing and ongoing cost of living in spore is not something a one time or two time small token sum from the govt can offset - they arent attractive even though it is still a token or gesture from the govt, gesture that may cost the govt something. It is like a drop of water, or two, trying to quench a growing fire - and they broadcast it. Cost of living is something more real than what our PM propose: money management - as if cost of living is the fault of our own mismanagement rather than its objective reality. Whether we manage our money well or not, look at the cost of our income and the price of a HDB flat nowadays. Singapore is just getting too expensive for majority of sporean, and i suspect that the govt can really do something about it other than claiming they know about our struggles and then giving out token sum, if the govt is concerned about birth rate. Remember the equation, remember the hidden constant that upset the variation: your average sporean cant afford private properties, and HDB's pricing is getting more private than public.  

Answer 20

I supposed that initiative enables the parents to have a visibility of the calibre of the future partner.Having said so,the child would be more confident to be assured with if the couple can be granted the acceptance of the parents.During the meet-up,if the assessment of the parents is unsatisfactorily.They can intervene at the right time before there is a wed-lock.  

Answer 21

From my point of view, Parental Match matching Sessions is not applicable as youngsters & singles nowadays will not be able to accept matchmaking by parents! Moreover, parents may not share the same judgement view of partner with their children. Financial stability before marriage is one of the worry.

Answer 22

To some extent, it may help to solve the problem of marriage but not BIRTH RATE. Getting married and increasing birth rate are two different issues although they are related.

You can still get married but may not want to have children.

So to address this problem, one must look/study at the environment that we are in.

Majority of the employers here are not really family-oriented. It is quite understandable because we are always lack of resources and the cost of living (rental especially) is getting higher and higher. Employers trying to earn a profit will tend to "squeeze" every bit out from any worker they employ (be it time and effort). The poor worker will have to follow by all means to keep his or her job secure. (example, working OT, not taking MC when sick etc).

The working hours in singapore must be REDUCED without comprising our effectiveness on the job. The concept and attitude towards working also has to be changed (be it employers or employees).

Workers should be given time-off (family day), flexible working hours or even flexible working environment to accomodate to their family. Singles should be encouraged to attend more social activities (employers should organize more activities etc)

Birth rate is always correlated to the environment we are in now. So with good conditions in place, one need not resort to matchmaking to increase birth rate.      

Answer 23

Now the cycle reaches the full circle.

In the formative years of our lovely Singapore, (Around the 60s), the call was Girl or Boy Two was Enough" not only that, parents who did not ligate would have their children at a disadvantage in school registration.

With the advent of better education, people in positions of responsibility should have triggered the alarm in the mid 70s onwards to start getting Singaporeans to actively procreate. This did not happen till the mid 80s.

Today we see that something old and archraic like match-making making a comeback? This despite opening our doors liberally .......

To reiterate, the cycle has reached its full circle.

Answer 24

The fact that so many Singapore Women are better educated nowadays means that we are not going to simply marry whoever our parents think is suitable for us. In this day and age, doesn't love count for anything?

Just because some people who are match-made "eventually love each other" does not mean that ALL will find the same success. What will happen then? We will find our selves with rising rates of divorce just because we want higher birth rates? A nation of broken homes? Is that what we want?

Women who are better educated want to use their head and their heart when they get married. It just does not make any sense for an educated woman to make an uneducated choice of going into a union blindly, just because her parents think the man is the one for her.

Answer 25

The main reason not to have children is their income,

if they have the income to meet all the economical challenges in singapore as automatically they look for next generation, no need to tell any body to give births.My humble advice is to  force the companies to hike the salaries as to meet as the living posibilities with one's own  families, eg...the rentals increased in a year 40%-50% as against as hiked the salaries of an employee is 2%-5% per annum.

Answer 26

There is no reason to resort to matchmaking to increse birthrates. The answer is very simple and lies in the business district of downtown Singapore. With the growing economy and incresed competition form foreign proffessionals, many fresh graduates and executives alike are struggling to make a career for themselfs.

Many of then cannot find the time to date, even if they find the right partner, many new couples end up getting divorced in and average of 5 years. Pressure from bosses, and pressure form family in terms of marriage and other factors in the lives of many Singaporeans contribute to the low birth rate. Welfare of the State or a Welfare State? One or the other has to give.

Answer 27

No. That's not the problem. Its not the problem of finding the right one. The current problem lies in the high living expenses. For e.g. Public housing. The location offered- Sengkang and Punggol is actually pretty bad. With Dawson which will be launching next year. The T.O.P is 2014. Its 6 years later and i wasn't even sure if i am able to get one. If i am getting married next year without my own home, how could i give birth to a child without any worries?

The property price of public housing e.g DBSS said designed to cater for 1st timer is very expensive. Not everybody can afford even the first down-payment at such a high price nowadays unless every Singaporean is born with rich parents. Imagined 5, 10 or 20 years back where new public housing is offered at better location and at affordable price? It really speeds up the whole process as everyone would prefer to get their own flat before getting married.

Answer 28

well the fact is that the modern youths of today appreciate independence and would like to cast away old traditional cultures.

I think that the concept of match-making may sound old to them and something disgraceful in their circle of friends. Match-making might seem like a solution but it's not effective on a whole. I can't imagine myself telling my friends i found my wife through a match-making session. I would probably be laughed at!

A parental match-making session would challenge the modern youth concept of independence. They might think that parents forcing them into marriages and would result in a aggressive outcome (fight and quarrels) and might even cause distant relations with parents. This is indeed unethical.

Rather then using old and traditional methods to convince others to give birth, why not opt for more modern methods such as health care bonuses and people who does household chores bared by the state which is practiced i think in France.

The idea is that parents need not worry too much about "home affairs" but instead they can put their heart at rest and go out to work.

Answer 29

No need to resort to match-making. Finding the person is easy. However the problem here is that cost of living in singapore is very high. Singaporean chinese couples tend to delay having a child to work and save money. By the time the save money, they're old already so how to bear  a child now?

Cost of living plays a big role in each and every Singaporean. Aside from this, women are so much into their career that they don't plan of getting married at an early age.

So how???  

Answer 30

Well the first thing the leader *** politicians should do is to find out why people have kids. Just having kids to support economy and replace ourselves will simply not work.

One reason people have kids is to enjoy them. These days with so many gadgets around to have fun and enjoyment is one less reason to not to have kids. People want to go out, travel, play sports, hang out with friends etc. These things seem to be of higher priority than kids. And eventually kids and lifestyle will be competing for same financial resources you have.

The other reason is people like to be independent these days, no one wants commitment, this can also be blamed on life style and consumerism.

People are also much more impatient these days and are less willing to  accommodate with their partners, which impacts long term relationships and in return procreation.

There can be many more reasons that can be found like the ones mentioned above. I feel the government policies are contradicting, on one hand they want us to keep spending what we have to improve economy and other hand to have kids which decreases your spending power.

Just increasing the birth rate is not the solution. Ok we have increased birth rate, what happens after that. Can we provide good upbringing to the kids and also ensure that they also procreate. If not then the problem is just delayed by one more generation.

I totally agree that we need a number, but quality is also important. We  don't want to have crooks running around this country to spoil all the great hard work put in by the previous generations and the government over the years.

Answer 31

Wait who is looking for a life long partner? The singles or their parents? The low fertility rate is not due to people not being able to find partners, but because the new generation of young people have their own sets of priorities.

Secondly, more Cs are required of the single males and career has taken a more significant place for single females.

Thirdly, for people like me, I would love to have more kids BUT the cost of living is much higher now than before. A family can't survive on one income and expect to have more kids. Yes, we can always get a helper so that I can go back to work BUT  what is the point of having more kids if I can't be there to see them take their first steps etc.

Lastly, maybe these singles just don't want to get married.