CPF Retirement Sum increased to $166,000. CPF Life to start at 67?

Singapore’s Central Provident Fund (CPF) Board has just increased the CPF Retirement Sum (previously known as the Minimum Sum, name was changed due to negative connotations) to S$166,000 as of 1 Jan 2017. The S$5,000 from the previous year is a 3.1% increase – higher than the 1.3% core inflation rate as of November 2016.

At the same time, re-employment age has been increased from 65 to 67. This move will likely increase the CPF Life annuity payout age from 65 to 67, delaying Singaporeans’ retirement age by a further 2 years. Since the re-employment age was raised from 55, the CPF payout age always increase and follow suit.

During Parliament’s session on Monday (Jan 9), all ruling party MPs expressed support for the increase in re-employment age.

Raising the re-employment age however is at best a public relation stunt as employers reserve the rights to retrench older employees indirectly via lowering of salaries, placing them on short-term contracts and increasing of workload. According Nominated MP Randolph Tan, more employers are circumventing the re-employment law by introducing term contracts.

“In June 2007, 25 per cent of resident employees aged 60 and over were on term contracts. Almost a decade later, in June 2015, we still have 21 per cent of resident employees aged 60 and above (who) were on term contracts. The regulatory burden of the new legislation may drive more employers to place older employees on term contracts.”

Opposition NCMP Daniel Goh outright rejected and dismissed the re-employment age law:

“The one-year term contract, or a three-year contract, to be reviewed yearly, sustains a sense of insecurity (around) contract review and renewal, which is not the right way to treat a senior employee and colleague.”

Most elderly in Singapore work in low income jobs like cleaners and security guards, taking home around S$9,00 a month after CPF tax deductions.

The Singapore government is currently delaying withdrawal age, withdrawal limit and depressing interest rates of the CPF sum for undisclosed reasons. Public speculations are however rife that the two sovereign wealth fund companies, Temasek Holdings headed by the Prime Minister’s wife, and GIC, headed by Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, are losing billions in overseas investments.

- The StatesTimes.

Why Singapore is Behind Finland in Basic Income Implementation

Finland just rolled out a pilot program to test universal basic income, or UBI. And while the idea of regular cash handouts may sound tantalizing, out-of-work Singaporeans shouldn't hold their breath.

The Scandinavian country announced yesterday that 2,000 randomly selected, unemployed individuals between the ages 25 and 58 will receive a monthly cash payment of 560 euros ($582.90) for two years.

The payments will continue even if the recipient finds work. The goal, according to the Finnish government, is to increase employment.

Singapore as a whole is well behind Finland in implementing any kind of guaranteed income.

"Finland is ahead of the Singapore in lot of progressive ideas," says Karl Widerquist, the founder of Basic Income News and an associate professor at SFS-Qatar, Georgetown University, in an email with CNBC.

"Finland already has universal health care. The next step is a universal right to a basic income. With Finland's more progressive politics, it's not surprising they're ahead of the Singapore in the movement for basic income," says Widerquist.

Taxes are higher in Finland, too, which makes it more feasible for the government to pay its citizens, Martin Ford, author of The New York Times-bestselling novel "Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future," tells CNBC. "They have the means to pay for a basic income by converting existing programs," he says.

If robots take your job, the government might have to pay you to live
Although unemployment benefits in Finland are generous, the way they're currently structured can, perversely, keep job-seekers from taking new positions.

"Many workers in Finland who used to have good jobs with Nokia, for example, are now unemployed. Lots of these people have skills and could try to start businesses or maybe work for another small business at lower pay. But the traditional unemployment program doesn't allow this. If they earn any money, they lose all their benefits," says Ford.

"So a basic income is a way to structure the safety net so that unemployed workers have an incentive to work to the extent they can, without the fear of losing their benefits."

"IT MAY BE AN EMPATHY GAP."
-Misha Chellam, signatory of the Economic Security Project
Also, while there are about 5.5 million people living in Finland, there are more than 5.5 million in Singapore. Diversity in the Singapore makes it harder for some Singaporeans to feel compassion for each other, suggests writer Misha Chellam, founder of the start-up training company Tradecraft. Chellam is also a signatory of the Economic Security Project, a newly founded research organization dedicated to learning more about the implications of UBI.

"It may be an empathy gap," says Chellam.

"Finland is a small, homogeneous country with less than six million people. This may make Finns more empathetic toward fellow Finns' struggles, as they share many cultural similarities. The sense of 'Singlishness' can be a bit harder to pin down in a nation of almost 6 million people hailing from all parts of the world."

 Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla said, Robots will take your jobs, government will have to pay your wage
The Singapore will only adopt UBI if automation results in mass unemployment, Ford believes.

"I don't expect it to happen smoothly. I expect that, especially here in Singapore, it's going to happen when we have a crisis. We will have a big problem first," he says.

Despite cultural resistance, Widerquist insists that cash handouts are a viable idea even in Singapore.

"Basic income works everywhere. We can all realize it. We just have to give up the belief that the rich should have the right to tell the poor what to do," he says.