Peering into the future can be unsettling these days. The prospects of strong growth have receded. This is happening at a time of disruption when jobs can come under threat. For Singapore, one way to weather the storm is to invest in sectors where quicker growth can shore up the rest of the economy. And for workers, the only guarantee of staying in a job is to pick up skills that employers of the future will look for. It was against this backdrop that Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Lawrence Wong announced Budget 2024.

In his Budget speech, he painted a grim picture of a world that could become “more violent, more fragmented, and more unpredictable” in the years to come. We have entered a “new era of conflict and confrontation” from which “there is no turning back”.