incentives only given to working mums only… how about those non-working mums who really take care of their children full-time??? this point was brought up in stratis times forum which i feel is a good point to raise…

i pity the non-working mums… sacrifice everything to give the best for their children and family… at the end of the day, government forgets about them… why don’t also give their husbands some tax incentives or benefits to also encourage them to have more babies??? why are they leaving the workforce when they can enjoy the benefits given by the government???

i am not sure what is government’s definition of singapore woman… are they superwoman??? government wants woman to contribute to the soceity so that more taxes can be collected and higher gdp for the country…. at the same time, also want woman to give birth to more babies… will this works??? time will tell…

i am still single in the mid-thirty… i will not just married because of money incentives given for sdu or any other forms… i feel that our society is slowly built and grown into a materialist society … our society has slowly forgotten the spiritual happiness about living… to live a life the fullest is not always must be quantify by numbers and conform to social norms…. what wrong with being single??? why are singles being penalised and viewed as aliens just because we are not married???

i agreed that without money, one can’t survive… but money is not everything in the world… how much money will be enough??? do you think people will stop asking more from government??? be patient and time will tell you the answers…

It’s the same problem with our “imported” athlete, can we buy a medal back?

What is the “real” problem behind it?

You could have more clearly described changing diaper as wiping pooh for the baby also. That is hard work man! imagine, several times a day, everyday for several years. also, constant supervision in case the baby is injured at home which is very easy to be injured without second by second supervision. yes, i agree that taking care of the baby is hard work. these aspects, some working mums leave it to a initially stranger, a maid , to take care. While it alleviates the mundane work from the mum, close contact between the mum and the child is lost. unfortunate incidences include maids who abuse the child due to whatever reasons. I ever seen a maid who , either purposely or ignorantly or accidentally let the child face the high noon sun when she strolling with the child in a stroller and the child lying flat on the stroller facing the sun. she was talking on the phone and the child got free suntan for several minutes. other unfortunate incidences include forceful shaking of the child who, due to some uncomfort that he or she was experiencing but could not tell the babysitter as the baby cannot talk yet. 1 such shaking could leave permanent brain damage of some level. Another ufortunate incident known from the news is something too sad to be mentioned. Remember , a baby is innocent, fragile and very easily broken with permanent damage if left unsupervised. Career or a child’s future more important? I suggest, if cannot afford the time and money, don’t pro-create. 1 less tragedy.

Someone may think I have a lot of time, but I can tell you the stress level is high. So high that sometimes, I wonder if everything is worth it when I am going through things. Given the urge from policy makers for fatherhood to increase in responsibilities, I don’t see why paternity leaves/ child care leaves and/ or benefits cannot be increased for fathers. Somebody mentioned the flip side of some fathers taking advantage of such leaves for personal/ company interests. That may be true in some cases, but the policy makers should not push the shared-responsibility argument too far, if they are not offering significant incentives to fathers.

Every day of failing to bring up the TFR is a lost cause. At the end, if the gap between our current demographics and the targeted one widens too much, the price to pay for population growth may be deemed too high by policy makers and the public, till no real solution can be found.

thus, pro-creation is very important and the gubby should give more help to parents. Look at what the other countries are doing. Not difficult to go there on a study trip, ask them to teach us how.

DO MORE – yes! But why can’t employers be more generous? There’s nothing in the employment act that says an employer CAN’T give more than 2 days’ paternity leave. This is when the government have to kinda FORCE IT ON EMPLOYERS to be more “giving”.

We faced this problem with cutoff date on many occasions during the past 25 years. Each time that new incentives were introduced, many parents felt disadvantaged by being on the wrong side of the cutoff date.

We never learned the lesson. Our birth-rate continued to decline over the years, in spite of the repeated efforts.

I met a Singaporean couple who worked in Perth and had their baby delivered there. The incentives given to parents in Australia are:

> AUD 5,000 on delivery of the baby
> 5 months of paid maternity leave
> An allowance to the mother who stopped work to look after the baby during the first two years

The incentive is simple, compared to our Baby Package introduced in Singapore.

Singapore has the unique system of incentives that differ according to the tax bracket of the parents, the working status of the mother, the birth order of the baby, the date of birth and other factors. We need to read a detailed booklet and to ask for explanation to understand the incentives.

I wish that the incentives are distributed more fairly to all parents, rather than for people to pray that they are lucky enough to get the incentives.

What does the word mean? Like me, most people do not know what the words you guessed means.

To me, it means Pay Long Pay.

To my fren it mean Pee Like Peter.

to others it means Please Lets Party

dun be so sensitive like a ….

I hope every S’porean woman can have as smooth and painless child delivery as she does. =)