Singapore’s quest for social mobility: Can education and policy keep it going?

SINGAPORE – Growing up in Singapore in the 1980s, Ms Lim Geok Keng had no doubt she would do better than her parents.

And she did. She upgraded from a three-room Housing Board flat in Toa Payoh to a landed property in Upper Thomson, and also moved up the corporate and income ladder.

Her Hokkien-speaking parents did not go beyond primary school education and one had a stall in a market while the other worked freelance jobs. But they sent her to Raffles Girls’ Primary School, where she did well – later earning a degree at the National University of Singapore and starting a career in finance.

Ms Lim, 53, said: “Social mobility wasn’t a concept that people spoke about – then it was about meritocracy. Study hard, you get a good job, and then you get better paid.”

Most of her schoolmates came from similar backgrounds.

But things are different – and tougher – for kids now, said the mother of four girls aged 16 to 23.

She said: “As Prime Minister Lawrence Wong said recently, education previously was a leveller – whether you came from an HDB (flat) or a bungalow. These days, some are so far ahead and some are so far behind.”

Ms Lim was referring to PM Wong’s

Sept 24 speech in Parliament

where he said the Republic will broaden its meritocracy to keep social mobility alive and pledged further educational reform to do so.

Breaking down the barriers to moving up in life in Singapore has been at the centre of national discussion recently as political leadership has made a push to highlight gaps and promised to strengthen the system to protect social mobility.

PM Wong’s speech followed President Tharman Shanmugaratnam’s

Sept 5 address

, where he identified social mobility as one of the priorities of this new term of Government.

MPs from the ruling PAP and the opposition Workers’ Party also raised the issue during the five-day debate in Parliament on Mr Tharman’s speech.

They spoke on inequalities that have opened up in wealth and education and the threat they pose to social mobility and national unity.

PAP newcomer Shawn Loh, a former Finance Ministry director, said the new challenge of this generation is to address wealth inequality, which is showing early signs of worsening.

“If we don’t address this fast enough, it will threaten to divide society. We will be broken into a million pieces, and we can’t go back,” he said.

WP’s Gerald Giam said widening inequality can, if left unchecked, “fracture” Singapore’s social compact and undermine the meritocratic system that has been key to its prosperity.

“A waning of that confidence could lead to distrust – both between different segments of society and with the Government – making it harder to forge the consensus required to navigate systemic challenges.”

Their concerns echo Ms Lim’s. She said less mobility could result in a less cohesive society and the erosion of a sense of togetherness between Singaporeans.

She said: “In the 1980s and 1990s when Singapore was growing very quickly, we felt like everyone could rise together and no one would get left behind.”

The experience of her eldest daughter, marketing executive Danielle Lim, has been different.

The 23-year-old Nanyang Technological University graduate said: “I feel like I’m very privileged and in a bubble – only a handful of people I knew at university had parents who came from a different background.”

Social mobility feels “rarer” now, she said, pointing to how she and her parents are all university graduates.

What is social mobility?

Studies from various countries including the US have found that the greater a society’s level of income inequality, the harder it is for people to move up the socio-economic ladder between generations, said NUS economist Ong Ee Cheng.

This means the more inequality there is, the less social mobility.

Broadly, social mobility refers to moving up the job, income, and to some extent, status ladder.

To Institute of Technical Education mechanical technology student Seh Jia Jun, 22, social mobility in Singapore is tied to moving up through its meritocracy and education system.

He said: “In my grandparents’ generation, if you worked hard and studied well, you would get into a good school and a high-paying job.”

Associate Professor Ong, who is co-director of the NUS Social Service Research Centre, said there are two types of social mobility – absolute and relative – that are typically measured by income changes between generations.

Absolute mobility means one has a higher standard of living than his parents.

Relative mobility refers to movement between income brackets, which can be upwards or downwards.

In Singapore, a direct study of intergenerational mobility was released by the Government in 2015, which measured the incomes of men born between 1978 and 1982 against those of their fathers.

The Finance Ministry paper found that of those born to the bottom quintile of families here, 14 per cent managed to move into the top quintile as working adults.

It said Singapore society was more fluid compared with other advanced economies like the US, UK and Denmark but warned then that “as the pace of Singapore’s development slows, it will be an increasing challenge to sustain such mobility in the future”.

Since then, decades of technological advancement – like the Internet revolution and advancements in artificial intelligence – and globalisation have accentuated inequalities, said Professor Irene Ng from the NUS social work department.

Publicly available statistics show a narrowing income gap, after years of high income inequality.

The Gini coefficient, a measure of income inequality, rose over the 1990s to peak at 0.48 in 2007 before it declined to 0.44 in 2024. After government redistribution mechanisms such as taxes and welfare payments, it was 0.36 in 2024.

This has been in part due to policy moves.

Over the past two decades, the Government raised the salaries of lower-wage workers through policies such as Workfare, an income supplement, as well as the Progressive Wage Model (PWM) that sets out a wage ladder for certain jobs through skills and productivity improvements.

Workers like mechanical maintenance supervisor Raman Kathavarayan, 53, have seen wages rise over the years. But he said education remains the central way for his two sons to achieve a better life.

He said: “Not only for my kids but all kids in Singapore. I want them to have a better education and a better job, better wages and a better future.”

The other side of the coin for closing income gaps is ensuring that the education system remains accessible and provides pathways towards jobs.

Over the past few years, the Government has done away with streaming, revamped the Gifted Education Programme and introduced subject-based banding while opening different pathways to success.

PM Wong has promised that more will be done in this new term of government to

reduce the stakes of single examinations

and change the way that workers are hired and promoted, by valuing their skills rather than grades.

Education had been a “great leveller” for himself and his peers, he said, but now is becoming an “arms race” for parents who fear their children will lose out.

Parents who have done well have poured extra resources into their children through enrichment classes or private education.

These advantages – wielded by the middle and upper-middle classes – help their children to maintain their economic position as they can get better-paying jobs with university degrees, said Prof Ong.

Prof Ng said “sticky ceilings and floors” have become an issue of concern in Singapore as in other advanced economies, in particular among researchers and non-profits.

The people at the top hardly move down, and the people at the bottom hardly move up, she said.

A 2016 study by the Singapore Children’s Society showed that students from “elite” primary and secondary schools were more likely to have come from families of higher socio-economic status than those from other schools.

This suggests underprivileged families may be starting out behind.

They often lack access to quality education, strong networks and supportive environments – affecting future opportunities, said Mr Clarence Ching, executive director of social mobility charity Access Singapore.

Citing a 2023 survey by his charity, Mr Ching said nine of 10 respondents believed strong social connections are necessary to secure attractive jobs, and 82 per cent believed that attending a “brand-name” secondary school influences future opportunities.

These families also face a deficit in “social capital” – or networks and connections.

Mr Ching called for the Government to continue investing in structural support that levels the playing field, such as expanded work-study and apprenticeship pathways into a wider range of white collar sectors.

Programmes like =Dreams hope to help bridge some of these gaps.

The boarding programme at Haig Road for children from rental homes provides them with academic help, resources to pursue interests and mentors to guide them. They may also participate in leadership talks and internships.

Tanjong Katong Secondary School student Abdul Azhar Abdullah, 14, is in his second year in the programme. His mother Siti Nur Faziela Othman, 35, said he has become more confident, independent and expressive.

She had hesitated to enrol him in the programme, as he would be living far away from the family’s two-room rental flat in Sembawang. But she was swayed by the extra academic help.

“At home, I may not be able to give him the same opportunities,” said Ms Faziela, who is an O-level school-leaver. Her husband Arfiyan Kamsani, 38, is an N-level school-leaver.

They did not have the same opportunities in their youth, having come from low-income families, she said.

“We hope and dream of him being able to complete his education, being independent, and becoming a responsible adult. Most importantly, we hope he will be happy, healthy and fulfilled whatever path he chooses,” she said.

Life was tough for her and her parents, but she feels her children have a better chance to break the “cycle of hardship”.

“I hope next time they will (do better) than us for their own kids.”

What’s next in the ‘perpetual quest’ for social mobility?

Mr Stanley Tan, who is behind =Dreams and chairs its board, said social mobility is not purely about economics. Singapore also has a “dignity problem” where some people and some jobs are considered more worthy than others, he said.

Even if plumbers here may not earn as much as private bankers, they should be valued for their contributions and respected, he said.

That is why =Dreams aims to help every child become the best version of themselves, and not the best version as defined by society, he added.

Absolute mobility is statistically possible for everyone, but relative mobility is not, said Prof Ong.

This is because for someone to go up, another must come down, she noted.

In a 2023 speech at the Economic Society of Singapore annual dinner, PM Wong, then Deputy Prime Minister, had said that

there were limits to focusing on relative mobility

.

Making room for people to move up would mean someone else having to move down, and there was a tendency to look at it as a zero-sum game, he said.

“What is more important is to ensure absolute mobility, so that everyone keeps moving up,” he added.

The Government has also refined its way of measuring income inequality, with the Department of Statistics updating the measure to include income from all other sources, like rental and investments.

This means a revised Gini coefficient of 0.38, which is slightly higher than the 0.36 after taxes and transfers.

There are concerns that the wealth gap has widened and may be the inequality to watch.

Some MPs, such as PAP newcomer and Senior Parliamentary Secretary for Sustainability and the Environment and Culture and Community and Youth Goh Han­yan, suggested tackling wealth inequality during the recent debate.

She said that while wealth taxes are tricky, Singapore needs to find its own way within the fiscal system to have the wealthy give more.

Singapore Management University law don Eugene Tan said wealth accumulation makes social mobility more difficult for those at the bottom.

“We must avoid getting into a state of affairs where social mobility is significantly predicated on wealth more than income.”

But showing that broad mobility is still possible in Singapore is a political priority for the Government as part of its compact with the people, said political observers.

Senior research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies Teo Kay Key said the Government’s move to address social mobility at the start of a new term likely highlights its commitment to ensure it remains possible in Singapore.

Prof Tan said that even as income inequality declines, the persistent perception of Singapore becoming less egalitarian is not helpful for social cohesion and political legitimacy.

Social mobility concerns are very much aligned with PM Wong’s Forward Singapore movement.

Prof Tan said: “The reality is that even if social mobility is not deteriorating, it remains tougher for some compared to others…

“It is the perpetual quest of any responsible government to ensure that one’s family’s background does not determine one’s outcomes in life.”