Four Seasons fill the measure of the year; There are four seasons in the mind of man.” This excerpt is from the poem "Sonnet. The Human Seasons” by 19th century English poet John Keats, likens human life to the passage of the four seasons. As we transition from the spring of childhood into the summer of youth and graduate into the autumn of middle age and the winter of old age, many of us count on our families to be there for us.
Survey: Family Outranks Work, Leisure in Singaporeans’ Values
Indeed, over 90% of Singaporeans polled by the Institute of Policy Studies for its global World Values Survey 2020, valued family as “very important”, compared to less than 40% for other facets of life such as work, friends, and leisure time.
While family mattered most to Singaporeans, the same IPS study shared that work was a higher priority for Singaporeans aged between 36 and 50 than other age groups, likely because this group of Singaporeans tend to be breadwinners who feel responsible for their family’s finances, care, and wellbeing.
The Motion Will Refresh and Renew Singapore’s Social Compact
Mr Speaker, I rise in support of the Motion put forth by Members Hany Soh and Zhulkarnain Abdul Rahim because the Motion urges a rational yet intuitive approach to refreshing and renewing Singapore’s social compact, so that Singaporeans can be supported and strengthened to cherish and value their families, whether they be families with young children or three generation households or singles living with ageing parents, through the uncertainty, adversity, and challenge of the different phases we pass through in a lifetime.
The Motion calls for a Singapore social compact that can help these Singaporean breadwinners to balance the economics and emotions of working and caregiving because doing so is integral to a Singapore Made for Families.
Then-DPM Wong also gave similar assurances when he said at the launch of the Forward Singapore exercise in June 2022, that “… Singaporeans and Singaporean workers will always be at the centre of everything we do.”
Such assurance matters because the year 2025 is unfolding in a world that is increasingly driven by technology and oftentimes delicate, uncontrollable, unpredictable and impossible to comprehend. Allow me to share about three groups of Singaporean breadwinners who must show courage as they brave a new wave of technological disruption that could upend livelihoods and intensify their challenge in raising their families.
What could be strengthened in our social compact so that these Singaporean workers can rise above new areas of adversity, challenge, and uncertainty, and be a pillar of strength and support for their families?
First, platform workers. During the debate on the Workplace Fairness bill, I pointed out that some became platform workers because platform work allowed them to earn a living despite their limitations. For instance, some platform delivery members from NTUC’s National Delivery Champions Association are single parents and the main caregivers to their young school-going children.
Because these platform delivery workers are careful to only accept platform jobs that they can fulfill when their children are at school, they worry that they could be deprioritised in job allocation and/ or fares by biases learnt or internalised by platform algorithms. Such action by the platform algorithms would hurt such platform workers’ livelihoods and compel these workers to unfairly choose between work and caregiving.
Given the rise in algorithmic management of workers, it is timely for a refreshed social compact to include safeguards that protect workers against exploitative algorithmic management practices that could arise when the business environment becomes complex and uncertain.
I would thus like to urge the government to consider requiring companies that apply AI to decisions affecting workers such as ride-hailing and platform operators, to provide transparent disclosure of the safeguards, whistleblowing avenues, and recourse in place to uphold non-discriminatory and responsible use of AI for decision-making that impacts workers.
I would also like to continue urging the government to consider requiring these AI-centric companies to adopt IMDA’s AI Verify governance framework that would guide companies to be transparent about their AI and build trust. Such moves would give greater assurance to breadwinners with precarious work such as platform workers.
Second, creative freelancers. Nearly 70% of 4,000 global marketing and creative leaders, surveyed by Canva, a multinational graphic design platform, expressed concern over potential job loss across industries due to Generative AI.
Generative AI and globalisation are reshaping the nature of creative work in Singapore. NTUC’s affiliated-association, Visual, Audio and Creative Content Professionals Association that represents freelance creative professionals, observed that companies are becoming more cost-conscious and have increasingly delegated tedious time-consuming tasks such as localising and personalising creative concepts for marketing campaigns to AI.
To further save cost, these companies are also offshoring entry-level creative work activities to lower-cost countries. These forces have upheaved the creative work value chain in Singapore and has affected a big swathe of local creative freelancers, some of whom had experienced up to a 30% drop in their income from creative work.
Given the increase in such external pressures on Singaporean freelance creative professionals, it is timely for a refreshed social compact to provide safe spaces for Singaporean creative professionals to unlearn and re-learn so as level up their thinking and technology-adoption in tandem with the opening of new avenues to monetise creative talent.
I would thus like to urge the government to take the lead in supporting the capability development of our local freelance creative professionals and the development of Singapore’s creative industry, by requiring principal creative agencies engaged by government ministries or agencies for creative projects to prioritise engaging Singaporean creative freelancers or enterprises for specialised expertise needed.
This is similar in concept to how the United Kingdom’s government procurement framework requires government departments to consider social value in awarding contracts. For instance, departments are guided to consider social value outcomes that have lasting impact to individuals, communities, and the environment such as “tackling economic inequality, including creating new businesses, jobs and skills” as well as “driving equal opportunity.”
Prioritising Creative Freelancers in Government Contracts
Likewise, having the government take the lead in contracting and subcontracting Singaporean creatives for government-commissioned projects would provide the safe space for these creative freelancers to apply new knowledge and technology that expand creative frontiers, capture new value, and elevate the standing of Singaporean creatives.
Such a move would pave the way for local creative freelancers to translate upskilling efforts into a differentiated creative portfolio. A differentiated creative portfolio matters because it can be a springboard for local freelance creatives to pitch beyond Singapore for higher value creative work and to command a premium for their expertise – both aspects critical to supporting Singaporean creative freelancers as breadwinners and pillars for their families.
Last, low-wage workers that technology could substitute. In July 2023, the McKinsey Global Institute published a report which found that many low-wage jobs in the food industry and in customer service in the United States could be eliminated by generative AI by 2030. For instance, devices like smart kiosks have allowed eateries to operate on a single site with fewer employees.
The same study suggests that workers in lower-wage jobs are up to 14 times more likely to need to change occupations than those in highest-wage positions, and most will need additional skills to do so successfully.
In Singapore, the 2023 edition of the government’s Jobs Transformation Map for food services sector highlighted the urgency to redesign food services jobs to make the sector attractive to Singaporeans. In response to lean staffing and technology advancements, redesigned food services jobs – whether service crew, kitchen assistant, or outlet manager – would likely see a shift towards an increase in the scope and responsibilities of roles.
Given the faster pace of change and wider scale of technology adoption, a refreshed social compact must include measures to help low-wage Singaporean workers who may be less literate in English language and digital skills deal with the stresses and expectations arising from the increased scope and responsibilities of their job roles.
Prioritising Training and Support for Low-wage Workers
I would thus like to urge the government and industry stakeholders to prioritise connecting low-wage workers with training that can help these vulnerable workers to pivot to the refreshed job scopes or to new career paths if their jobs will likely be replaced by automation.
I would also like to urge employers to take a broader and longer-term view when making business plans; planning for the future must go beyond investing in automation and ought to extend into building workforce capabilities and increasing accessibility to work to help these workers to balance work/ life needs.
For instance, low-wage workers could be more willing to pivot if their employer had catered adequate training and time to build these workers’ competence in interacting with emerging technologies and changing customer demands. These workers could also be more prepared to stay on in the job if their employers offered flexi-work arrangements that could allow these workers to manage work around their needs at different life situations.
Such a move would give cause for optimism than worry of job displacement; it would also boost the confidence of these vulnerable breadwinners in facing the challenge of technology advancement and stressful life situations head-on.
Conclusion
To conclude, for many of us, around one-third of our life would be spent working. Work gives us dignity, income security, and boosts our feelings of self-worth. A Singapore Made for Families must therefore be anchored by a refreshed and renewed social compact that would give a boost to the livelihood skills and opportunities of our over-500,000 Singaporean platform workers, creative freelancers and low-wage workers facing the advancement of emerging technologies and economic renewal.
As-a-whole-of-society, we must step up to the plate in our roles as government, employers, unions and more, to give these groups of fellow Singaporeans a leg up and raise their families well and imbue confidence in these families that they too can access support to thrive and enjoy in their journey through life.
