Got this picture from the Ministry of Manpower website. I don't really know what I should make out of it. Should I be happy or should I be worried for my future. There seems to be a trend towards upgrading oneself in almost all face of recession in Singapore. It happened in 1997, 2002 and now 2009. And I believe this cycle will continue as long as I live here. This is something I have come to accept but not try to forget. It's denial/ignorance of this Singaporean life cycle that makes one unemphatic about being Singaporean.
Singapore is thus indeed unique in this sense that livelyhood and employment trends are always critically depandent on how well the ecomony does. Singapore makes a living through importing and exporting goods. When the economy slums, for whatever reasons, like the recent the meltdown of the global financial system, we, Singaporean will be like very naked shores. For our tides brings in wealth but also tsunamis. We are easily exposed.
Which also brings up the question of most importance, education. Does the education policy of Singapore fit into the economic shceme of things? Is Singapore too ambitious of supplying too many fields of study that it doesn't consider what the employment market actually requires? And is it because of this arrangement, that some Singaporeans choosen to migrate not only because of field of work but also because of fierce competition and the lack of political freedom or, all of the above?
What then does it say for those who have been left out by the economy? What does it say for stayers? How does retrenchment impact those, from construction workers to bankers and have their lives come to a halt? How does one after years of good education or employment, reconcile with the fact that his or her fate is a good as the economy gets? Why has the Singapore system been so?
Comments (5)
it's not about what you know now..it's about who you know..
why are you asking such complicating questions at 3:37 AM on the west coast..go to sleep! lol
@immaairheadxl - totally agree with you there.. when I first came to Singapore to work ignore the fact that I had already been working for 3 years, they first thing they wanted to see was my university transcripts and I was even asked why I failed one subject which had nothing to do with my field of work (IT)..
The photo speaks initially of "memory gap." LOL. As if the blank white silhouettes of people are people unknown to the guy in the center. :p
and yet it hard to imagine how one can proceed to keep moving forward without constantly improving oneself, no?
its sad isn't it.
We just have to keep working and learning and continue upgrade ourselves till the day we die of exhaustion.
I often wonder, is it more exhausting to survive in Hollywood or to survive in Singapore? Both are about constant repackaging and transforming. Which tops which?