How the PAP Government builds up our reserves

If you want good government, you need good leaders. Even in the best of systems, if the leaders in charge are bad, the government will be bad. - Lee Kuan Yew, 19 Jan 1994 

Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat noted that earlier generations of leaders and finance ministers were very prudent, even during the years when Singapore's gross domestic product was growing 8 to 9 per cent annually.

"They did not take it upon themselves and say, 'Well, look, this is a great bonanza and for a government to be popular let's spend all that'."

The Government exercises prudence and great restraint in spending the reserves, to safeguard the future of future generations of Singaporeans.

Elsewhere this is NOT ALWAYS THE NORM.

We see cautionary tales of elections descending into auctions, with political parties competing with each other to promise greater largesse from their nation’s coffers.

Take GREECE, for example, where political parties engaged in a “disastrous competition” to offer patronage, cronyism, nepotism, and welfare populism.

Once the populist policies were set in place, it was difficult to turn back as it would be “political suicide” for any party to do so.

The end result was economic and political bankruptcy and a younger generation that finds that its future has been mortgaged.

AUSTRALIA is another example. They have tightly contested elections in rapid 3-year electoral cycles. One party comes up with a programme, the other offers more, each trying to outbid the other.

This has led successive governments to continue spending accumulated surpluses from a resource boom, which by now are gone.

In Singapore, our opposition parties too will spend the reserves, if they can, to make themselves popular if they are in charge.

Tan Jee Say was famous for saying that $60 billion from our reserves is just small change.

And WP's Low Thia Khiang once asked then Finance Minister Tharman if it was possible for Singapore to have the benefits of a welfare state without their taxes. How do you give people free education, free housing, free healthcare without raising taxes? You know the answer.

Our reserves are not to be taken for granted. We do not want our children's future mortgaged.