How much money does a household of parents and children in Singapore need to meet their basic needs? According to researchers, a couple with two children (aged 7-12 and 13-18) need $6,426 a month, while a single parent with one child (aged 2-6) needs $3,218 a month.

The team of researchers, led by Dr Ng Kok Hoe from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKYSPP), National University of Singapore, conducted 24 focus group discussions involving 196 participants from diverse backgrounds. They applied a consensus-based methodology known as Minimum Income Standards (MIS), which can be used to determine the household budgets necessary for households of various kinds to meet their basic needs.

The team’s previous study, published in 2019, investigated the budgets necessary for households of older people living alone or as couples. The updated budget for a single elderly person is $1,421 in 2021, taking price inflation into account. This new report measures the costs of basic needs for a household of parents (single or partnered) with children for the first time.

Building on a general definition of basic needs determined in the 2019 study, focus group participants generated lists of items and services related to: housing and utilities; things needed in each area in a HDB flat; personal care and clothing; food; transport; social participation; education and childcare; and healthcare. The needs of children were considered according to their gender and age group (below 2 years old; 2-6; 7-12; 13-18 or 19-25).

Each item or service was only included if participants reached a consensus that it was a basic need, and could explain why. Participants also agreed on rules for when and how an item can be shared among family members. For instance, whether children can share a bedroom depends on factors like their ages and genders, and the demands of working or schooling limit how many individuals can share a laptop.

Based on this analysis, the research team has also created an online calculator, allowing users to see breakdowns for household budgets for parents (single or partnered) living with up to three children in varying combinations of age and gender.

Key findings

1. In 2021, the household budgets necessary to meet basic needs are:
   • $3,218 per month for a single parent with one child (aged 2-6).
   • $6,426 per month for partnered parents with two children (aged 7-12 and 13-18).
   • $1,421 per month for a single elderly person.
     
     
2. The budgets for the two working-age households are both around $1,600 per household member. As the average work income per household member for the third decile group of employed households in Singapore in 2020 is $1,609, this indicates that 30% of working households earn less than required for these two types of households to meet their basic needs.
   
   
3. The researchers suggest that a reasonable starting point for a living wage in Singapore is $2,906 per month. This is based on the average budget for a couple with two children, assuming two full-time earners, and adjusting for taxes as well as all universal and major means-tested benefits. The median work income among all workers in 2020 exceeded this amount by 56%, but current PWM wages fall significantly below.
   
   
4. The costs of education and care dominated the budgets for children’s needs, inspiring animated discussion in the focus groups. While some costs associated with children decline with age, others increase sharply. As current measures supporting education and care taper off for older children, parents are likely to face greater financial strain as their children grow up.
   
   
5. In calculating a budget for housing, the researchers found that current public housing policies effectively double housing costs for single parents who have never married, compared to partnered, widowed or divorced parents.

“These two waves of research give us a comprehensive view of basic needs across the life course,” said Dr Ng, who also leads the Social Inclusion Project at LKYSPP. “They provide a concrete benchmark and starting point for discussing how people may achieve the incomes they need, including allowing us to calculate a possible living wage.”

Said Associate Professor Teo You Yenn from Nanyang Technological University, another member of the research team and author of the best-selling This Is What Inequality Looks Like: “The focus groups were especially animated in discussing education, with participants expressing strong consensus for and yet frustration at the need for tuition and enrichment. Both parents and young people showed concern that economic barriers can prevent children from obtaining necessary qualifications.”

Asked to comment on the report, Linda Lim, Professor Emerita of corporate strategy and international business at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business, University of Michigan, said, “Singaporeans agree that we need to raise the incomes of low-wage workers—but to what level? This careful and timely study provides a ground-up estimate of what it costs for families with children and elderly households to maintain a basic standard of living in our expensive city. It shows that current income-support systems are inadequate.”

MIS research was first developed by researchers at Loughborough University’s Centre for Research in Social Policy in the UK. It has since been used in the UK, Japan, South Africa, Mexico, France and Ireland. Matt Padley, the Centre’s Associate Director, said, “The value of this methodology lies not in assuming that basic living standards are universal, but in the recognition that shared conceptions of living standards are shaped by specific contexts and reflect local circumstances. This report is at once rooted in the particular context of Singapore, identifying pressing economic and policy challenges, but it also alerts us to broader questions that many countries need to urgently address.”

Abigail Davis, also Associate Director of the Centre for Research in Social Policy, said, “This report makes an important contribution to public policy debates spanning every aspect of citizens’ lives across the life course. Through detailed analysis of MIS for different households compared with levels of state assistance the findings make a clear and compelling case for the reassessment of current provision for parents, particularly lone parent households, and for pensioners.”

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Find out more about MIS and the latest report.

How much income do households in Singapore need to achieve a basic standard of living? In 2019, we published a report using MIS methodology to address this question in relation to older people, living alone or as couples. In our 2021 report, we discuss the incomes required by parents (single or partnered) living with children up to 25 years old.

Join us on 8 October for the Zoom launch of this report. Register here.

Our focus groups are resuming. Do sign up if you meet the above criteria and are interested in taking part in discussions on basic needs in Singapore.

This article by Teo You Yenn, Ng Kok Hoe, Neo Yu Wei, Ad Maulod and Stephanie Chok was first published on Academia.sg.

Political parties contesting in the 2020 General Election have pledged to address inequality and poverty. During campaigning as well as after the new government forms, the policy question on the table will not be whether, but how, we should address this. For a start, how should we define the basic standard of living that political candidates say Singaporeans deserve?

“A basic standard of living in Singapore is about, but more than just housing, food, and clothing. It is about having opportunities to education, employment and work-life balance, as well as access to healthcare. It enables a sense of belonging, respect, security, and independence. It also includes choices to participate in social activities, and the freedom to engage in one’s cultural and religious practices.”

What older people need in Singapore: A households budgets study (May 2019)

This definition  was crafted through data generated from focus group discussions, and then used in multiple rounds of discussions with ordinary Singaporeans over the past two years. It includes things that are concrete—housing, food, clothing—as well as things that are abstract—belonging, respect, security, independence. It is a definition that reflects people’s shared sense of basic needs in its multiple facets.

We expect this definition to be robust and stand the test of time, but COVID-19 is a crisis on an unprecedented scale. So we have to wonder: have certain needs become more urgent, and others less so? Are people shifting their expectations of what ‘basic’ means? Are they meeting basic needs in new ways? We convened two special focus group discussions over Zoom to investigate these questions.

We saw in our participants’ lives many things we have experienced in our own: the challenge of ensuring every member of a family has a device for work or study; the struggle for private and quiet space at home; changes in grocery shopping and food consumption patterns; the drastic reduction in social encounters—whether with friends and family, or teachers, classmates, and co-workers. 

Mostly our participants seem to have adjusted well—they did not express resentment, impatience, or skepticism at the necessity of these shifts. In several instances, they talked about positive aspects of the past months at home—the opportunity to spend more time with family, or healthier eating habits, for example. One very perceptive young person pointed out that suspending some of one’s own needs for things like social participation is important at a time like this, because the health and wellbeing of the whole community is at stake. Human needs, as we have often emphasized, are not generated and experienced individually, but collectively in society.

Of all the needs captured in the definition of a basic standard of living, two stand out as particularly relevant: security and independence. Security refers to financial stability and freedom from worry, so that life goes beyond basic subsistence and people can access things and experiences that bring pride, pleasure, and joy. Independence is about being able to take care of oneself and not rely on others, and having autonomy to make choices.

Pre-crisis, the needs for security and independence were somewhat met by reasonable expectations of employment opportunity and continuity during one’s working age. But even then, older people expressed a lot of anxiety about falling sick and losing mobility. They were concerned about the cost of healthcare and becoming a source of financial burden for their children. Many worried that the younger generation may find it hard to cope or ever achieve their aspirations. In a poll conducted by the Straits Times after our study was released, working-age people reported worry that they may not be able to provide for their own families and support their retired parents at the same time. The participants in our study rarely mentioned any sort of collective ‘safety net’ provided by society–it did not seem to be something people could count on.

Although our participants seemed to have adapted reasonably well since COVID-19 struck, there was a stronger and more palpable anxiety in  recent conversations. It appears that needs for security and independence may be increasingly difficult to meet. There was much talk about how things will look in the next few years, and what the pandemic’s effects will be for livelihoods in the longer-term. Older participants, in their 40s and with children, worried openly about  losing jobs and income; they do not have security because they know their savings will not last long. Still in their prime working age, with children to support, these people count on continuing employment to meet their and their young families’ needs. 

Younger respondents, in their 20s, still studying or just beginning careers, are finding it hard to hold on to the independence they were beginning to carve out. With the crisis, many lost part-time jobs they had depended on to support themselves. Indeed, contrary to stereotypes of ‘soft’ or irresponsible young people, many were cognizant of their parents’ financial circumstances and contributed financially to their households. For them, the need for independence, once on the cusp of realisation, now looks more elusive.

Security and independence have both tangible and intangible dimensions. Respondents are very clear that this is not merely an abstract feeling—it requires money to buy all the things that one needs to live. But they are also feelings. A sense of security and a sense of independence are things people need. They are important for people to attain wellbeing. Younger participants were especially articulate about this—pointing out that mental health is deeply and negatively affected when people lose their senses of security and independence. One shared that when she thought she would be fired, she could not eat or sleep for weeks.

How people feel about their futures has important consequences for their current actions.  This in turn has deep and significant implications for society. For example, when young people experience insecurity and a lack of independence, they put longer-term plans—buying a flat, getting married, having children—on hold. When people tighten their expenditures in anticipation of harder times, as our respondents have, it affects overall consumption in the economy and therefore businesses and jobs.

The sense of insecurity we witnessed in our focus group discussions may be a direct reflection of these extraordinary times. But it is also a reminder that the role of social policies is to provide assurance that people will not, as one participant put it, “fall through the bottom” precisely when times are hard. 

How people view the future depends on how they weigh their capacities and potential against the demands and risks in the environment. Individual capacities depend not just on personal and family resources, but also on collective commitments to ensure  basic living standards in society. Policy arrangements express these collective commitments. Indeed, security has always been one of the main purposes of social policies globally. Modern social welfare is geared towards providing protection during non-income-generating stages in the life cycle (such as care, education, and pensions for children and elderly people), as well as buffer against contingencies (such as income protection during sickness, disability and unemployment).

From our research over the years, we have learnt that unequivocal, scientifically-derived standards are critical for rational, transparent policymaking that will give people a sense of assurance and confidence about their futures. If policies are not based on principles and benchmarks that people understand and accept, they will always feel like they can be suddenly taken away. We know too that having a policy in place is only the first step. How it is designed and operated will determine people’s actual experiences. When social assistance is difficult to qualify for, onerous to access, insufficiently generous to meet basic needs, and come attached with social judgement, they add to people’s sense that they have to manage on their own, regardless of their difficulties. 

The fallout of the pandemic will be long and protracted. Struggles to meet basic needs, both tangible and intangible, material and abstract, will likely intensify. Ordinary people are now more conscious than ever of how all our fates are shared. We have seen in the past few months that people mobilise and find affirmative meaning in community and sharing, numerous donation and volunteer drives demonstrating solidarity. They cast doubt on arguments that Singaporeans will not support measures to redistribute income more fairly, or that older and younger generations are in competition for resources they would each rather keep for themselves.

The pandemic has revealed, in Singapore and elsewhere, the deep costs of inequality. Solutions have to be bolder. There is no sidestepping the need for redistribution to adequately protect those not adequately rewarded by market mechanisms. Security and independence are basic needs—necessary to everyone’s well-being, and consequential to the collective wellbeing of society—and social policy must address these in the recovery. 

Political leaders and policy makers now have the extraordinary opportunity to create the conditions for greater solidarity. We urge them to forge a social policy regime that is transparent and consistent in its rationales, systematic and fair in its consideration of diverse interests, and oriented toward ensuring that everyone in society is able to meet basic needs.

In light of the new social distancing measures announced by the government and the recent increase in cases of COVID-19, our team is temporarily suspending all focus groups.

We are very grateful for the interest shown to date by potential participants in our research. Those interested are still welcome to register. We will get in touch when we re-start the groups. Thank you for your patience and support.