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Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Who Watched Pre/Post-Lecture Tutorial Videos? Does Flipped Learning Help Beginners In Economics?, Bei Hong
Who Watched Pre/Post-Lecture Tutorial Videos? Does Flipped Learning Help Beginners In Economics?, Bei Hong
Research Collection School Of Economics
The modern-day classroom is characterized by academic diversity, with students from varied backgrounds and with different levels of prior knowledge. To cater to the diverse abilities of students, this paper explored the use of flipped learning as a teaching approach in an introductory economics course. We investigated the effectiveness of 40 pre-lecture videos covering basic concepts and 27 post-lecture tutorial videos focusing on practice in improving students' exam outcomes, especially for beginners in economics who may require more support from instructors than other students. We collected data about video engagement and students' grades in progress assessments. Surveys were conducted to …
Short-Term Impact Of Covid-19 On Consumption Spending And Its Underlying Mechanisms: Evidence From Singapore, Seonghoon Kim, Kanghyock Koh, Xuan Zhang
Short-Term Impact Of Covid-19 On Consumption Spending And Its Underlying Mechanisms: Evidence From Singapore, Seonghoon Kim, Kanghyock Koh, Xuan Zhang
Research Collection School Of Economics
We examine the short-term impact of COVID-19 on consumption spending and labor market outcomes. Using monthly panel data of individuals mainly aged 50–70 in Singapore, we find that COVID-19 reduced consumption spending and labor market outcomes immediately after its outbreak, and its negative impact quickly evolved. At its peak, the pandemic reduced total household consumption spending by 22.8% and labor income by 5.9% in April. Probability of full-time work also went down by 1.2 pp and 6.0 pp in April and May, respectively, but employment and self-employment were only mildly affected. Our heterogeneity analysis indicates that the reduction in consumption …
Rethinking The Role Of Employment Barriers In Active Labor Market Policy: Evidence From A Fixed Effects Analysis, Jian Qi Tan, Irene Y. H. Ng, Kong Weng Ho
Rethinking The Role Of Employment Barriers In Active Labor Market Policy: Evidence From A Fixed Effects Analysis, Jian Qi Tan, Irene Y. H. Ng, Kong Weng Ho
Research Collection School Of Economics
Using a panel dataset from a five-wave survey of participants in Singapore’s Work Support Programme (WSP) from 2010 to 2016, we quantify the cumulative negative impact of facing multiple employment barriers and demonstrate the association between the individual stressors and labor market indicators. Using a fixed effects model to reduce the confounding effects of unobservables, we find that a one standard deviation increase in the number of employment barriers brings about a 2.7 to 3.5 percentage point increase in the probability of being unemployed and a 58 SGD to 78 SGD decrease in individual earnings.
Tapping On Growth Opportunities Through Trade And Investment, Andy Feng, Gerald Foong, Geraldine Lim
Tapping On Growth Opportunities Through Trade And Investment, Andy Feng, Gerald Foong, Geraldine Lim
Research Collection School Of Economics
As a small and open economy, external developments play a crucial role in shaping Singapore’s growth prospects. In particular, external demand is pivotal in supporting the growth of Singapore’s gross domestic product (GDP) beyond the limits afforded by a small domestic market. Furthermore, due to the resource constraints faced by Singapore, its production of goods and services to meet both external and domestic demand requires a substantial use of imported inputs. Apart from trade, Singapore’s openness and outward-orientation also extend to its embrace of inward and outward investments to grow its economy and create jobs for Singaporeans. In view of …
Challenges To Social Mobility In Singapore, Kong Weng Ho, Marcus Kheng Tat Tan
Challenges To Social Mobility In Singapore, Kong Weng Ho, Marcus Kheng Tat Tan
Research Collection School Of Economics
Singapore had achieved impressive economic growth together with a high level of upward mobility since her independence in 1965. However, the growth process might have become more uneven, in addition to diminishing growth for a matured economy like Singapore, which is also a highly open city state subject to competitive forces from other economies. Singapore has fared well recently,
evident from the 2020 social mobility findings reported by the World Economic Forum and the decline in Gini coefficients for the past decade. We discuss the education system in Singapore and the recently formed National Jobs Council, both important institutions for …
Achieving Price Stability, Hwee Kwan Chow, Taojun Xie
Achieving Price Stability, Hwee Kwan Chow, Taojun Xie
Research Collection School Of Economics
The aim of delivering medium-term price stability is the stated objective of the Monetary Authority of Singapore. To this end, the central bank adopted an unusual exchange rate–based monetary policy framework that has served the economy well over the past decades. However, the shift from the phase of catch-up growth to a mature economy raises the question of whether the current monetary policy framework needs reformulation. Moreover, as global financial integration deepens, surges in cross-border capital flows impact Singapore’s exchange rate and asset prices, which has implications for economic dynamism and inclusion. Since a large and persistent deviation of the …
Providing Childcare, Christine Ho, Sunha Myong
Providing Childcare, Christine Ho, Sunha Myong
Research Collection School Of Economics
Women’s economic empowerment has been hailed as one of the most remarkable revolutions in the past 50 years. Yet, women still face the lion’s share of the burden of childcare despite major progress in their education and earnings capacity. This is particularly salient in many Asian countries. This chapter proposes a synthesis of the state of knowledge on childcare and discusses policy-relevant issues applicable to the Singapore context. Selected policies are documented and lessons from the international landscape are discussed. Raising children incurs both direct costs in the form of childcare and opportunity costs in the form of career costs. …
Singapore In The Global Value Chains, Pao-Li Chang, Tran Bao Phuong Nguyen
Singapore In The Global Value Chains, Pao-Li Chang, Tran Bao Phuong Nguyen
Research Collection School Of Economics
This chapter analyses the participation of Singapore in the global value chains (GVC): how much of its gross exports are GVC-related trade; how downstream it is; and which countries are its key upstream and downstream trade partners. The analysis is carried out both at the country aggregate level and at the sector level. New formulas are proposed in the gross export decomposition framework of Koopman, Wang and Wei (2014) and Borin and Mancini (2017), to characterise a country/industry’s downstreamness in the GVC and the importance of each trade partner in its backward/forward linkages. Singapore started off with a very high …
High-Frequency Internet Survey Of A Probability Sample Of Older Singaporeans: The Singapore Life Panel, Rhema Vaithianathan, Bryce Hool, Michael D. Hurd, Susann Rohwedder
High-Frequency Internet Survey Of A Probability Sample Of Older Singaporeans: The Singapore Life Panel, Rhema Vaithianathan, Bryce Hool, Michael D. Hurd, Susann Rohwedder
Research Collection School Of Economics
Facing a rapidly ageing population, Singapore is presented with urgent policy challenges. Yet there is very little data on the economic, health and family circumstances of older Singaporeans. In response, the Centre for Research on the Economics of Ageing (CREA) at Singapore Management University has been collecting monthly data on a panel of Singaporeans aged between 50 and 70 years. We detail the methodology by which the Singapore Life Panel® (SLP) was constructed using a population-representative sampling frame from the Singapore Department of Statistics. Contact was made with 25,000 households through postal, phone and in-person canvassing. More than 15,200 respondents …
Happy Lottery Winners And Lottery-Ticket Bias, Seonghoon Kim, Andrew J. Oswald
Happy Lottery Winners And Lottery-Ticket Bias, Seonghoon Kim, Andrew J. Oswald
Research Collection School Of Economics
The world spends a remarkable $250 billion a year on lottery tickets. Yet, perplexingly, it has proved difficult for social scientists to show that lottery windfalls actually make people happier. This is the famous and still unresolved paradox due initially to Brickman and colleagues. Here we describe an underlying weakness that has affected the research area, and explain the concept of lottery‐ticket bias (LT bias), which stems from unobservable lottery spending. We then collect new data—in the world’s most intense lottery‐playing nation, Singapore—on the amount that people spend on lottery tickets (n = 5626). We demonstrate that, once we correct …
The Effects Of Income On Health: Evidence From Lottery Wins In Singapore, Seonghoon Kim, Kanghyock Koh
The Effects Of Income On Health: Evidence From Lottery Wins In Singapore, Seonghoon Kim, Kanghyock Koh
Research Collection School Of Economics
We estimate the causal effects of household income on self-reported health status by exploiting random variations in the amount of lottery prizes won. We find that a S$10,000 (US$7,245) increase in income via lottery wins improves individuals’ health by a standard deviation of 0.18. As possible mechanisms, we find that lottery wins increase household consumption spending and improve overall life satisfaction, but do not change healthcare spending, labor supply, and risky health behavior. Previous studies, which focused on the health effects of lottery prizes in Western European countries with strong social safety nets, do not find positive effects other than …
Housing Equity And Household Consumption In Retirement: Evidence From The Singapore Life Panel©, Lipeng Chen, Liang Jiang, Sock Yong Phang, Jun Yu
Housing Equity And Household Consumption In Retirement: Evidence From The Singapore Life Panel©, Lipeng Chen, Liang Jiang, Sock Yong Phang, Jun Yu
Research Collection School Of Economics
Housing affordability for elderly homeowners involves an entirely different set of issues as compared to housing affordability for first-time homeowners. To afford to ‘age-in-place’ may require homeowners to access channels that enable them to withdraw their housing equity to finance consumption in retirement. We utilize data from the Singapore Life Panel© survey to empirically investigate the impact of housing equity on the consumption of elderly households. Based on panel analysis, we find housing equity value has no significant impact on non-durable consumption for elderly people. The conclusion holds for a battery of robustness checks. Moreover, heterogeneity analyses based on subsamples …
Universal Minimum Wage Is Not Suitable For Singapore, Zhengxiao Wu
Universal Minimum Wage Is Not Suitable For Singapore, Zhengxiao Wu
Research Collection School Of Economics
In a commentary, SMU Senior Lecturer of Statistics Wu Zhengxiao examined the concept of a universal minimum wage, and discussed how it is not suitable for Singapore.
Covid-19, Lockdown, And The Dynamics Of Subjective Well-Being, Terence C. Cheng, Kim, Kanghyock Koh
Covid-19, Lockdown, And The Dynamics Of Subjective Well-Being, Terence C. Cheng, Kim, Kanghyock Koh
Research Collection School Of Economics
We provide novel evidence on how the COVID-19 global health and economic crisis is affecting overall life satisfaction and domain-specific satisfaction using data from a monthly longitudinal survey of middle-aged and older Singaporeans. Using a difference-in-differences framework, we document large declines in overall life satisfaction and domain-specific satisfaction during the COVID-19 outbreak, except satisfaction with health. These declines coincide with the introduction of a nationwide lockdown, with life satisfaction remaining below its pre-pandemic levels even after the lockdown is lifted. We also find that individuals who report a drop in household income during the COVID-19 outbreak experience a decline in …
The Aging Of A Young Nation: Population Aging In Singapore, Rahul Malhotra, Andre M. Muller, Su Aw, Gerald Choon Huat Koh, Yin-Leng Theng, Stephen James Hoskins, Chek Hooi Wong, Chunyan Miao, Wee-Shiong Lim, Chetna Malhotra, Angelique Chan
The Aging Of A Young Nation: Population Aging In Singapore, Rahul Malhotra, Andre M. Muller, Su Aw, Gerald Choon Huat Koh, Yin-Leng Theng, Stephen James Hoskins, Chek Hooi Wong, Chunyan Miao, Wee-Shiong Lim, Chetna Malhotra, Angelique Chan
Research Collection School Of Economics
The juxtaposition of a young city-state showing relative maturity as a rapidly aging society suffuses the population aging narrative in Singapore and places the “little red dot” on the spotlight of international aging. We first describe population aging in Singapore, including the characteristic events that shaped this demographic transition. We then detail the health care and socioeconomic ramifications of the rapid and significant shift to an aging society, followed by an overview of the main aging research areas in Singapore, including selected population-based data sets and the main thrust of leading aging research centers/institutes. After presenting established aging policies and …
Housing Equity And Household Consumption In Retirement: Evidence From The Singapore Life Panel, Lipeng Chen, Liang Jiang, Sock Yong Phang, Jun Yu
Housing Equity And Household Consumption In Retirement: Evidence From The Singapore Life Panel, Lipeng Chen, Liang Jiang, Sock Yong Phang, Jun Yu
Research Collection School Of Economics
We utilize data from the Singapore Life Panel© survey to empirically investigate the impact of housing equity on consumption of elderly households. Based on panel analysis, we find housing equity value has no significant impact on non-durable consumption for elderly people. The conclusion holds for a battery of robustness check. Moreover, heterogeneity analyses based on subsamples by age of household head, house type, and number of property possessed also show no significant impact of housing equity on consumption in general. Finally, we use scenario analysis to study the Lease Buyback Scheme (LBS), a novel housing equity monetization scheme which allows …
Building An Equitable And Inclusive City Through Housing Policies: Singapore’S Experience, Sock Yong Phang
Building An Equitable And Inclusive City Through Housing Policies: Singapore’S Experience, Sock Yong Phang
Research Collection School Of Economics
Inequality is an age-old concern. In recent years, the rise of income inequality has received worldwide media and policy attention, beginning with the Occupy movement of 2011-2012 and a wave of notable scholastic books such as Stiglitz (2012), Piketty (2014), and Atkinson (2015). Piketty’s Capital in the 21st Century, an unlikely bestseller, contained a vast amount of data showing that the rich are taking rising shares of income and wealth in the advanced economies. Piketty’s approach towards capital and wealth is an aggregative one, and he does not treat real estate or land as a different or distinct form of …
Financial Sector In Singapore, Hwee Kwan Chow, Sai Fan Pei
Financial Sector In Singapore, Hwee Kwan Chow, Sai Fan Pei
Research Collection School Of Economics
This chapter reviews the financial development strategies adopted by the Singapore government as it navigates internal and external changes to build a vibrant center of finance in the Asia Pacific region. Sections 2 and 3 provide an overview of the structure of the financial system and the financial governance framework respectively. This is followed by a discussion, in Section 4, on the outward looking development strategy that underpinned the successful development of Singapore’s financial sector. Section 5 highlights the reforms undertaken in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis that led to the building of a well-diversified and thriving international …
Labour Research Conference 2018: Upskilling Of Mature Workers, Stephen Hoskins, Luca Facchinello
Labour Research Conference 2018: Upskilling Of Mature Workers, Stephen Hoskins, Luca Facchinello
Research Collection School Of Economics
Many developed countries are approaching an era of ageing population due to an increase in longevity and decrease in fertility rates. Singapore is no exception, having one of the fastest ageing populations in Asia, which is driven by low fertility rates and the third longest life expectancy in the world. The number of elderly citizens, defined as those aged 65 and above, is expected to triple to 900,000 by 2030, making up about 28% of the total population in Singapore (Population SG, 2016). This changing population age profile, combined with a competitive labour market, means it makes business sense to …
Policy Innovations For Affordable Housing In Singapore: From Colony To Global City, Sock Yong Phang
Policy Innovations For Affordable Housing In Singapore: From Colony To Global City, Sock Yong Phang
Research Collection School Of Economics
Global cities today are facing fundamental challenges in relation to unaffordable housing and growing economic inequality. Singapore’s success in making home ownership possible for 90% of its population has attracted much attention internationally. This book represents a culmination of research by the author on key housing policy innovations for affordable housing. Housing policy changes were effected in the 1960s through reforms of colonial legislation and institutions dealing with state land acquisition, public housing, and provident fund savings. The comprehensive housing framework that was established enabled the massive resettlement of households from shophouses, slums and villages to high-rise government-built flats. In …
Income And Subjective Well-Being: Evidence From Singapore's First National Non-Contributory Pension, Yanying Chen, Yi Jin Tan
Income And Subjective Well-Being: Evidence From Singapore's First National Non-Contributory Pension, Yanying Chen, Yi Jin Tan
Research Collection School Of Economics
We use a new monthly panel and a difference-in-differences strategy to study the effects of an exogenous permanent income shock on subjective well-being along previously unexplored dimensions. This permanent income shock is the introduction of Singapore’s first national non-contributory pension, the Silver Support Scheme. The pension improved the life satisfaction of recipients, and appeared to be driven by social, household income, and economic satisfaction. Consistent with the predictions of standard consumption-savings models, well-being improved when the shock was unanticipated (at announcement), but did not improve significantly further when the shock was anticipated (at disbursement). In addition, we find evidence that …
Contributors Of Singaporean Youths' Wellbeing: Life Goals, Family-Community-Nation Capitals, Opportunity And Social Mobility, Kong Weng Ho
Contributors Of Singaporean Youths' Wellbeing: Life Goals, Family-Community-Nation Capitals, Opportunity And Social Mobility, Kong Weng Ho
Research Collection School Of Economics
Life goals induce one’s current investment and set one’s expectations of future outcomes, affecting one’s current state of subjective wellbeing. Using National Youth Survey (NYS) 2016, which has a representative sample of Singaporean youths, we find that non-zero-sum life goals such as family-oriented life goals and altruism-oriented life goals enhance happiness and life satisfaction of Singaporean youths while career-oriented life goals, zero-sum in nature, reduce subjective wellbeing. Apart from personal motivations or life aspirations, perceived social mobility (in terms of career opportunity and meritocracy) matters positively in the subjective wellbeing of both youths in school and in the workforce. Family …
The Impact Of The Cost Of Car Ownership On House Price Gradient In Singapore, Naqun Huang, Jing Li, Amanda Ross
The Impact Of The Cost Of Car Ownership On House Price Gradient In Singapore, Naqun Huang, Jing Li, Amanda Ross
Research Collection School Of Economics
This paper examines the extent to which a change in the cost of car ownership affects the house price gradient with respect to distance from the central business district (CBD). Theory suggests that if the cost of car ownership increases, then people will shift towards other modes of transportation, thus reducing house prices farther away from the CBD. However, the cost of car ownership is likely to be endogenous and correlated with various unobserved factors that also contribute to a change in the house price gradient. To obtain causal effects, we exploit a unique feature of Singapore’s car registration process. …
Retirement Adequacy Of Mature Workers In Singapore, Rhema Vaithianathan, Stephen Hoskins
Retirement Adequacy Of Mature Workers In Singapore, Rhema Vaithianathan, Stephen Hoskins
Research Collection School Of Economics
In the last decade, the Singapore resident population has grown older with more elderly and fewer younger people. As Singapore Department of Statistics noted, the proportion of residents aged 65 years and over has increased from 9% to 13% over the past ten years. There are now fewer working-age adults to support each resident aged 65 years and over as indicated by the falling resident old-age support ratio from 7.7 in 2007 to 5.1 in 2017. The support ratio is expected to halve to 2.5 by 2030. As Singaporeans are both living and working longer, it is vital for the …
Invitation Strategy For Cutting Edge Industries Through Mncs And Global Talents: The Case Of Singapore, Kim Song Tan
Invitation Strategy For Cutting Edge Industries Through Mncs And Global Talents: The Case Of Singapore, Kim Song Tan
Research Collection School Of Economics
Singapore presents an interesting case of how a country achieves dynamic economic development and innovation through the "invitation" strategy of a business hub. Despite being a small city-state with limited domestic market size and no meaningful hinterland or natural resources to speak of, Singapore has managed to transform its economy dramatically over the past 50 years by leveraging the strengths of other economies. Specifically, it has been able to attract (or "invite") various types of productive resources, including foreign capital, foreign technology and foreign workers (both skilled and unskilled) to make up for what it lacks. This has helped Singapore …
Housing Policies In Singapore, Sock Yong Phang, Matthias Helble
Housing Policies In Singapore, Sock Yong Phang, Matthias Helble
Research Collection School Of Economics
Singapore has developed a unique housing system, with three-quarters of its housing stock built by the Housing & Development Board (HDB) and homeownership financed through Central Provident Fund (CPF) savings. As a result, the country’s homeownership rate of 90% is one of the highest among market economies. At different stages of its economic development, the Government of Singapore was faced with a different set of housing problems. An integrated land–housing supply and financing framework was established in the 1960s to solve the severe housing shortage. By the 1990s, the challenge was that of renewing aging estates and creating a market …
Contributions To The Committee On The Future Economy, Singapore Management University
Contributions To The Committee On The Future Economy, Singapore Management University
Research Collection School Of Economics
In response to the call to contribute to the dialogue initiated by the Committee on The Future Economy (CFE), SMU has held a series of engagement sessions with faculty and staff to brainstorm and propose recommendations to add to the government’s deliberations on strategies for the next stage of Singapore’s economic growth. Through the leadership of SMU Provost, Professor Lily Kong, faculty and senior staff produced various recommendations on five key areas namely Corporate Capabilities and Innovation, Future Growth Industries & Markets, Future of Connectivity, Future City and Future Jobs and Skills.
Cointegration Of Matched Home Purchases And Rental Price Indexes: Evidence From Singapore, Badi H. Baltagi, Jing Li
Cointegration Of Matched Home Purchases And Rental Price Indexes: Evidence From Singapore, Badi H. Baltagi, Jing Li
Research Collection School Of Economics
This paper exploits the homogeneity feature of the Singapore private residential condominium market and constructs matched home purchase price and rental price series using the repeated sales method. These matched series allow us to conduct time series analysis to examine the long-term present value relationship in the housing market. Three key findings are obtained. First, we fail to establish a cointegrating relationship between the home purchase price and rental price based on nationally estimated indexes. Second, area-specific indexes demonstrate strong cross-correlations, invalidating the use of first generation panel unit root tests that ignore these cross-correlations. Third, Pesaran's CIPS test indicates …
Singapore’S Housing Policies: Responding To The Challenges Of Economic Transitions, Sock Yong Phang
Singapore’S Housing Policies: Responding To The Challenges Of Economic Transitions, Sock Yong Phang
Research Collection School Of Economics
Singapore has developed its own unique state-driven housing system, with more than three quarters of its housing stock built by the Housing and Development Board and homeownership financed through Central Provident Fund savings. As a result, it has one of the highest homeownership rates amongst market economies. This paper provides a historical perspective of the main housing problems faced by successive prime ministers and their respective policy responses. Under the leadership of Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew (1959-1990), the government established an integrated landhousing supply and housing finance framework to channel much needed resources into the housing sector to deal …
The Role Of The State In Singapore: Pragmatism In Pursuit Of Growth, Kim Song Tan, Manu Bhaskaran
The Role Of The State In Singapore: Pragmatism In Pursuit Of Growth, Kim Song Tan, Manu Bhaskaran
Research Collection School Of Economics
This paper looks at how government intervention shapes the evolution of the Singapore economy and accounts for its successes and failures over the past 50 years. Compared with other dynamic Asian economies, the Singapore government's approach to intervene in the economy is both more extensive and more intrusive, but with a narrow focus on GDP growth and surplus accumulation as the primary objectives. The ruling government's near complete dominance in politics has enabled it to mobilize resources to create the preconditions for strong GDP growth and high savings. But the impact on the broader development of the economy and the …