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The article examines population and population policy in Singapore. A decline in the country's birth rate since 1977 to below replacement level s examined, as are forecasts population will begin to decline by 2025 without additional immigration or an improbably sharp rise in births. The economic and social impact of the aging of the baby boom generation are discussed.

Focuses on the granting of bonuses to families for the second and third babies by the government in Singapore. Revision of sagging Total Fertility Rate; Impact of the project on the economic, political and social status of the country; Creation of balance between population size and age structure.

The paper traces the development of Singapore as an 'intelligent' island through an identification of the various social policy arrangements which have harnessed new information technology modes in their delivery. At home, at work, on the road, in public service and in the court room, the emergence of new IT arrangements is a matter of fact in Singaporean lives. Attention is drawn to the 'unencumbered' character of IT policy-making in Singapore, a characteristic which is the outcome of little or no strong political opposition in parliament. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, various pro-natalist policies have been adopted in Singapore and other high-income Asian countries with low fertility, aiming at raising fertility rates. Previous studies were mainly focused on the impact or outcome of the policies. This paper, however, aims to identify the most influential groups in determining Singapore's total fertility rate (TFR) and evaluate the targeting of pro-natalist measures adopted by the government. We first reveal the changing age-parity-and-marital-status composition of women at childbearing age, and further conduct an elasticity analysis to assess the roles of different subgroups of women in changing the TFR. Our results show that compared to other groups, the 20–29-year-old single women and the married childless women aged 30–34 (‘married’ throughout this paper includes women who are or have been married) are more influential in determining the TFR and should be the potential pro-natalist target groups. However, Singapore's pro-natalist policies are more in favour of third and higher-order births. Such mismatch indicates that, if more efforts are devoted to facilitating marriage and first births in these potential groups, the TFR may be increased effectively. In order to achieve a long-term and significant fertility reversal, it calls for a long-term and integrated policy package. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]