Why is Singapore no longer "cool"?

2/10/2026 at 8:23:52 AM

As a German expat who lived in Singapore for 3 years, it’s still the best country I ever lived in and I’ve also worked in Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan HK, and Germany.

Everything works, it’s very efficient, public transit and internet is good and it’s extremely safe. It also has great food and has low taxes.

Most Western countries just can’t compete and while the UAE is pretty well run in some aspect, there’s always the religious part which makes me uneasy when I’m there.

As a single person without kids, there is no better place than Singapore.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 1:21:49 PM

As a german, are you ok with the human rights violations happening in Singapore

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_Singapore

https://www.hrw.org/world-report/2025/country-chapters/singa...

As a german, are you ok with the death penalty (for as little as 14 grams of drugs)? Are you with violent and cruel corporal punishment (for as little as vandalism)?

by GeoAtreides

2/10/2026 at 2:04:58 PM

Yes, for most part. SG has a zero tolerance policy.

I do think the death penalty for drugs is reasonable. Drug dealers destroy families and communities for their own profit. The arrival card in Singapore literally states that smuggling drugs is punishable by death. If you still attempt, that sounds like a “you” problem.

Also the punishment for vandalism or rape sounds reasonable.

The treatment of foreign construction workers is not good and can be improved.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 4:31:50 PM

> I do think the death penalty for drugs is reasonable.

Well, it's not. It's barbaric and primitive. A warning is no justification.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 4:53:17 PM

> Well, it's not. It's barbaric and primitive. A warning is no justification.

It's actually Singapore that turned me against the death penalty. I saw a photo on a news site one day showing a casket in Singapore, with some kind of placard showing the decedent's name, DOB, and then the date that they "died."

They didn't die due to illness or injury; they died because Singapore executed them. That was it for me.

by dblohm7

2/10/2026 at 5:13:33 PM

Executing people guilty of serious crimes is good and just. They should have a proper trial, and the crimes should be sufficiently serious, but execution is no more or less "barbaric" than the alternatives. As Adam Smith said, "mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent."

by acoard

2/10/2026 at 5:16:41 PM

> Executing people guilty of serious crimes is good and just.

Wrong. It's barbaric and primitive.

> execution is no more or less "barbaric" than the alternatives

Yes, it is. People make mistakes. People have infinite possibility to grow, change and contribute to society. Snuffing everything someone is out because of an arbitrary society rule that ultimately does less harm than murder is indefensible.

> "mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent."

Taken as far to defend murder it becomes nonsense.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 8:30:15 PM

Rape, murder, drug smuggling, terrorism are not mistakes you accidentally make. These are serious crimes destroying lives and the offenders do not deserve a second chance.

It’s also a repellent.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 8:55:00 PM

Drug smuggling doesn't always destroy lives, sometimes it's just giving people something that shouldn't be illegal in the first place. Rape can very much be a crime of passion and a mistake. Terrorism can be the result of indoctrination. Rape while less likely to be a mistake also doesn't deserve the death penalty.

Yes, all these offenders deserve a second chance. Extreme penalties to set a deterrent are not justice. Just barbarism. Very primitive people.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 8:36:18 PM

> Wrong. It's barbaric and primitive.

Source?

> Yes, it is. People make mistakes. People have infinite possibility to grow, change and contribute to society. Snuffing everything someone is out because of an arbitrary society rule that ultimately does less harm than murder is indefensible.

Putting aside statistics on actual reform instead of fantastical infinite possibility, as I understand this policy mostly serves to deter foreigners from attempting the potentially very lucrative business of smuggling drugs into Singapore. Even if Singapore didn't take the "barbaric" approach of executing them, they would have to either host them as prisoners on their already very limited land, or go through the process of deporting them to their home country, where they might not even face any consequences and just try again. Why should they bear this burden for people who have no ties to Singapore and will never contribute anything to it?

by HighGoldstein

2/10/2026 at 8:57:56 PM

> Source?

Do you know what an opinion is?

> as I understand this policy mostly serves to deter foreigners from attempting the potentially very lucrative business of smuggling drugs into Singapore.

So what? That's not a justification.

> Why should they bear this burden for people who have no ties to Singapore and will never contribute anything to it?

Singapore is perfectly able to control their borders better than most countries. It's not like the US where it's relatively easy to sneak in. 'They might come back' is a poor justification for murder.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 11:07:52 PM

>Do you know what an opinion is?

Cool, what makes _your_ opinion better than mine, or that of the Singaporeans?

>Singapore is perfectly able to control their borders better than most countries. It's not like the US where it's relatively easy to sneak in.

Okay, why should they? Drug traffickers are perfectly capable of not attempting to smuggle drugs into Singapore.

by HighGoldstein

2/10/2026 at 11:15:59 PM

> what makes _your_ opinion better than mine, or that of the Singaporeans?

Because I believe it can be supported and be shown to be objectively correct. Not that I'm willing to put in the effort when it already took this much for you to realize I was stating an opinion though.

> Okay, why should they? Drug traffickers are perfectly capable of not attempting to smuggle drugs into Singapore.

If you think casual murder is fine because it's convenient, I don't think there's much for us to discuss anyway. We clearly have drastically different values. I'll just take solace in the fact that Singapore likely won't survive another 100 years.

by JCattheATM

2/11/2026 at 10:21:38 AM

> Because I believe it can be supported and be shown to be objectively correct.

Out of curiosity, How can your argument "be supported and shown to be objectively correct" ?

It seems the evidence is actually the other way around. After introduction of the death penalty in the 90s, the average net amount of opium trafficked to Singapore famously dropped by ~70%.

I do not support the death penalty myself, but primarily for ethical and moral reasons to preserve our humanity - which is constantly under attack. But not "objective ones" since the evidence clearly supports the death penalty for "objective reasons". For these positions, objectivity should be left in the gutter.

by lenkite

2/11/2026 at 2:38:53 PM

> After introduction of the death penalty in the 90s, the average net amount of opium trafficked to Singapore famously dropped by ~70%.

If we introduced the death penalty for minor shoplifting, minor shoplifting would probably drop by a huge percentage. Would that justify it?

> But not "objective ones" since the evidence clearly supports the death penalty for "objective reasons". For these positions, objectivity should be left in the gutter.

I disagree. When you evaluate all the pros and cons, I think the evidence is solidly against the death penalty.

by JCattheATM

2/11/2026 at 6:56:55 PM

> If we introduced the death penalty for minor shoplifting, minor shoplifting would probably drop by a huge percentage. Would that justify it?

Of-course it wouldn't - but you are precisely reinforcing my point. Because opponents can claim via evidence that the death penalty is effective for this, if you argue on the basis of "facts". Thus, objectivity should not be used as an argument for an ethical and moral human principle. Such principles stand by themselves to maintain the sanctity of the human soul - no justification needed.

by lenkite

2/11/2026 at 7:56:07 PM

> but you are precisely reinforcing my point. Because opponents can claim via evidence that the death penalty is effective for this, if you argue on the basis of "facts".

I don't believe I am. The death penalty being effective at reducing a crime isn't itself a sufficient justification of the death penalty.

> Thus, objectivity should not be used as an argument for an ethical and moral human principle. Such principles stand by themselves to maintain the sanctity of the human soul - no justification needed.

We do have objective arguments though; ultimately everything can be quantified by the amount of harm or good it does.

by JCattheATM

2/11/2026 at 5:38:08 PM

> Because I believe it can be supported and be shown to be objectively correct.

Then that's not an opinion, it's a proposition aiming at fact, and you should back it up rather than restating it loudly and more slowly when asked for justification.

by eli_gottlieb

2/11/2026 at 7:54:35 PM

It can be both. There's such a thing as opinions that coincide with facts. Until I put in effort to support it though, I only offer it as an opinion.

> you should back it up rather than restating it loudly and more slowly when asked for justification.

It's a fair amount of work to do so, and I haven't seen anyone worthy of putting in such work. This site isn't great, from a practical point of view, for that type of lengthy debate, either.

by JCattheATM

2/11/2026 at 10:19:40 PM

>and I haven't seen anyone worthy of putting in such work

So aside from the subhuman Singaporeans who should be violently forced to adopt your ethics, it is also everyone on HN that is far below your golden ethical level and not worth of effortful discussion (but definitely worth moral lecturing and grandstanding), got it.

by HighGoldstein

2/11/2026 at 11:34:57 PM

> So aside from the subhuman Singaporeans who should be violently forced to adopt your ethics,

I didn't use the word subhuman, I used the word barbaric, and that's more regarding the authoritarian regime in power.

> it is also everyone on HN that is far below your golden ethical level and not worth of effortful discussion (but definitely worth moral lecturing and grandstanding), got it.

There's plenty of people who I could have a great, in-depth, reasonable discussion with, it's just that you're not one of them. Even this reply of yours is mainly bait, reliant on twisting things to get a reaction.

You're one of those commenters who needs to have the last word...this unproductive discussion is still going to go in for a few more replies yet because you can't let stuff go. I'm guessing my comment offended you because you live in Singapore and like it, is that it? All of this is just defensiveness?

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 6:23:38 PM

> execution is no more or less "barbaric" than the alternatives.

You'll need to put more thought into it. Imagine your kid traveling somewhere, smoking pot, flying back to Singapore, getting randomly checked and facing consequences.

by allarm

2/10/2026 at 8:32:59 PM

They don’t execute your kid for smoking pot.

“Any Singapore Citizen or Permanent Resident found to have abused drugs overseas will be treated as if he/she had abused drugs within Singapore. Consumption of a controlled drug is an offence and a person may face imprisonment of a minimum of 1 year and up to 10 years, or a fine not exceeding S$20,000 or both.”

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 5:30:55 PM

There is saying in The Culture that money is a sign of poverty.

There should also be (and probably is in a culture that has drone slapping), that death penalty is a sign of moral bankruptcy.

by GeoAtreides

2/10/2026 at 6:10:26 PM

Ah, ‘tolerance’.

by lazide

2/10/2026 at 7:08:55 PM

I have no tolerance for blatantly unethical activities, things or people.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 7:16:22 PM

Sounds impossible.

by lazide

2/10/2026 at 7:26:20 PM

Hardly.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 8:27:17 PM

And yet, reality disagrees.

by lazide

2/10/2026 at 8:52:40 PM

Hardly.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 10:01:23 PM

Compelling. I can’t wait for your online master course.

by lazide

2/10/2026 at 10:34:03 PM

It's as compelling a response as your original refutation deserved.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 8:37:16 PM

Define unethical.

by HighGoldstein

2/10/2026 at 8:58:20 PM

Hit up Merriam-Webster at your own leisure.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 11:10:07 PM

": not conforming to a high moral standard : morally wrong : not ethical"

I see nothing here that applies to executing drug traffickers.

by HighGoldstein

2/10/2026 at 11:17:35 PM

Because you don't want to, I guess. I'm not particularly interested in discussing this with you because I don't get the feeling from your responses so far that there is a possibility of productive high-level discussion. Take care.

by JCattheATM

2/11/2026 at 9:06:09 PM

Pot-kettle-black?

by lazide

2/11/2026 at 9:19:16 PM

You're welcome to think so. Have a great day :)

by JCattheATM

2/11/2026 at 6:17:40 PM

The paradox of tolerance is well studied and we've thru this song and dance for decades. Your "tolerance" would turn the whole world into North Korea/Singapore totalitarian society and we must not just "disagree" with you but violently resist and remove you from our society much like the communists . Arguments for tolerance against such parasitic .antonsocial. Anti liberty behaviors is beyond stupid.

by asacrowflies

2/10/2026 at 2:30:26 PM

Yes

by diggyhole

2/11/2026 at 8:31:15 AM

As a European absolutely yes and I wish we had the fortitude to do it. It would literally save the EU. We never will, so right wing populism and the struggle to suppress it will probably destroy Europe.

by rapsey

2/10/2026 at 3:15:43 PM

Yes

by umuttalha0

2/10/2026 at 3:08:18 PM

Yes

by 837263292029

2/10/2026 at 1:24:51 PM

Yes

by wormpilled

2/10/2026 at 10:17:55 AM

I would argue even with kids it is great (but of course can be expensive!). I lived and worked there for a couple of years during COVID with a young family and loved it (once the lockdowns and pandemic stuff blew over of course).

As you mentioned, for families, it’s extremely safe, everything is well run and maintained so healthcare and education are not a concern. Proximity to other countries for travel is excellent (well, I’m from Melbourne so much easier to get places than from here!), and the country it self has plenty to do for families in terms of activities, shopping, and food.

Beyond that, I found Singaporeans just really great to work with and be around. It’s really multicultural, they value education and talent so the workforce is full of bright and capable people, and there is a huge expat community as well.

The only major downside for me - the heat and humidity! It was a struggle the first few months for sure.

by milchek

2/10/2026 at 2:11:46 PM

The heat can definitely be intense. It can also get a boring fast because it’s such small place, so traveling is a a must! I believe with kids it can be a challenge because there’s conscription for males and that also applied to permanent residents.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 9:05:22 AM

It's strange that you mention the religious part of UAE making you uneasy, and not the modern day slavery.

by huhkerrf

2/10/2026 at 12:38:06 PM

A country where 10% of people are citizens, there’s a few expats, and nearly everyone else is a Bangladeshi or Nepali slave laborer doing all the work. With no rights, no prospect of citizenship, etc. The Davos view of where societies are headed.

by rayiner

2/10/2026 at 2:46:58 PM

The no prospect of citizenship is not an issue. Everyone just goes to the UAE for the lack of taxes and the money, not to become a citizen.

The benefit of not granting citizenship is that it makes it much easier to kick out people again and maintaining benefits for citizens.

by shell0x

2/11/2026 at 6:19:29 PM

I mean it's a person praising Singapore .. their moral values are so self evident I have to question you even bringing up... Like duh. They LIKE that part lol

by asacrowflies

2/10/2026 at 10:01:22 AM

To be fair, Since they have lived in quite a few locations you can easily become desensitized to the conditions of these so called "slaves". The conditions of them in the UAE are not verry different from Singapore. The law allows for transportation on the back of open trucks, mass casualty traffic incidents involving the poorest workers are common. For a maid if they want to change employees they need permission from their current employer and the current employer can choose instead to repatriate them, with 30 days to exit the country and no money or means to challenge any mistreatment the abused are simply expelled and forgotten about. You can imagine the power imbalance, sa cases, torture and malnutrition. To the outsider it looks well balanced but it is simply well segregated. Even public housing has a ratio per building causing minority races to be unable to sell their properties on a level market rate.

The local mouthpiece even has a topic for maid abuse https://www.channelnewsasia.com/topic/maid-abuse

by destory-everyth

2/10/2026 at 2:40:10 PM

Having a maid is actually a huge benefit for most expats/locals in SG, Hong Kong and Dubai. They’re basically part of the family but you need a helper if you work until 8pm.

If you hire a maid and fire her, you have to pay her repatriation back to her country of origin.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 2:22:17 PM

Because the religious part affects me, the slavery I don’t really notice because they do a good job hiding it?

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 7:40:43 PM

This really does describe the expat in Dubai mindset pretty well, sadly.

by huhkerrf

2/10/2026 at 5:53:07 PM

Does hiding it well make it ok?

by free_bip

2/10/2026 at 8:37:20 PM

It’s not okay but I’m not moving to THEIR country and tell them how to run it. Most people want to live their life and safety and taxes are major factors affecting quality of life

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 6:11:20 PM

Ok or not, it certainly makes it easier to ignore?

by lazide

2/10/2026 at 2:42:31 PM

They have a very opaque and subjective permanent residency program. So while they get all the benefits out of you as an immigrant, they may provide none in return.

by sharmajai

2/10/2026 at 12:46:04 PM

> Everything works, it’s very efficient, public transit and internet is good and it’s extremely safe. It also has great food and has low taxes. Most Western countries just can’t compete…

Why do you think New York or Chicago isn’t like this? What could western countries change?

by rayiner

2/10/2026 at 1:12:02 PM

This is obviously oversimplified but I think this is a big factor:

Singapore is a business masquerading as a country. While it is technically democratic, in practice there are some barriers preventing truly free and fair elections. That being said, the leaders in Singapore are not corrupt and truly do focus on what's best for the country. As a result decisions are made quickly, for the greater good, and are not politically driven. The leadership have the latitude to make decisions that they believe will make the country better. Sometimes these decisions don't have a lot of public support (because people are naturally more short-sighted) but, because of the political system, they don't need to rely on public support.

In the case of Singapore, I think this dynamic has led to a compounding effect of good decisions that have put the country in such a strong place today. You see this similarly with Norway's oil fund; it was likely unpopular initially to reinvest so much money into savings, but today it's paying off where they have a $2T savings account, from which they can withdraw up to 3% annually ($60B) for the needs of Norway.

by acrooks

2/10/2026 at 5:54:04 PM

> That being said, the leaders in Singapore are not corrupt and truly do focus on what's best for the country. As a result decisions are made quickly, for the greater good, and are not politically driven.

But what makes them act this way, lol? That's what every country wants out of its leaders. Why is Singapore able to do it? I know that's a hard question to answer...

by rayiner

2/10/2026 at 3:08:53 PM

> Singapore is a business masquerading as a country

I don't see why this would lead the country to being well organized. All the big businesses I've seen are very inefficient and disorganized internally, where decisions are made slowly, mostly to benefit the decisionmaker's little princedom inside the company.

by TremendousJudge

2/10/2026 at 2:19:33 PM

I think it’s a mix of valuing education more, a strict enforcement of the law with severe punishment, a small area to maintain, electing educated politicians and demographics. Asians tend to commit less violent crimes. Markham in Canada for example has a much lower violent crime rate than most of the Canada and is predominantly Chinese.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 2:39:58 PM

> Asians tend to commit less violent crimes.

Wealthy Asians tend to commit less violent crimes. If you go to a country with less law and order (like PNG), you’ll see more violence.

America and other countries had a spike of Vietnamese, Hmong, and Chinese gangs in the 80s/90s due to a refugee influx from Vietnam. Turns out a forcibly relocated, non-wealthy population who has to readjust to live in a new country is going to have issues, even if they are Asian.

by seanmcdirmid

2/10/2026 at 5:50:43 PM

The correlation between per-capita GDP and homicide rate is fairly weak, and if you graph it and color-code it you can clearly see that asian countries tend to have lower homicide rate at similar income levels: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/homicide-rate-vs-gdp-pc?y...

Countries like Bangladesh have fewer homicides than Canada, and less than twice as many as the U.K. or Sweden, while much richer Latin American countries have 5-20 times as many.

by rayiner

2/10/2026 at 6:02:42 PM

Chicagos biggest problems are corruption and special interests. Corruption means that labor has become very expensive for the government and most civil servant leaders tend to be incompetent. The incentives created when being in leadership is not about competence led to an environment where very few in the government are interested in improving the systems they run and those that focus on improvement generally don’t rise to obtain more power. The power of special interests means that it is impossible to make quick decisions, even if they are obvious. Everything is a long, drawn out process, so the decisions that are made tend to be the ones that benefit people who can pay lobbyists. Singapore is pretty much a benevolent dictatorship. Their government makes quick, technocratic decisions that legitimately attempt to make society as a whole better in the long run. The short term popularity of these decisions is effectively irrelevant, which allows them to do things like employing slaves and being extremely tough on crime.

by HDThoreaun

2/10/2026 at 2:54:47 PM

Switzerland is like this and is also a real democracy. Although the food is not as good.

by currymj

2/11/2026 at 3:25:29 AM

In Switzerland you're not going to rent or buy any housing. If a miracle somehow happens you'll live in hotel room sized studio and your full time job will be rental laws and regulations. With no housing it's irrelevant how real the democracy is there.

by lifestyleguru

2/12/2026 at 2:32:48 PM

I have rented an apartment in Zürich (a hotel-room sized studio as you say, though with high quality construction and amenities). it was indeed pretty frustrating to go through the apartment search, but it is possible to rent housing, as evidenced by the fact that millions of Swiss citizens and residents live indoors.

by currymj

2/12/2026 at 8:11:51 PM

> but it is possible to rent housing, as evidenced by the fact that millions of Swiss citizens and residents live indoors.

Otherwise you are on a fast track from "unable to find housing" to "have to leave the country".

by lifestyleguru

2/11/2026 at 10:11:38 AM

The rail system is good enough that you can live 30min from most cities and be in the country side where prices are not crazy.

by panick21_

2/12/2026 at 8:49:15 AM

No sorry, the real democracy has spoken and said no housing for you.

by lifestyleguru

2/10/2026 at 9:05:05 AM

That’s a lot of places to live. Moving to the UK from the US for me was already mentally draining logistically so curious how you balance that

by rschachte

2/10/2026 at 2:08:21 PM

When I was in my twenties, I didn’t really buy stuff and apartments in Asia are mostly fully furnished. All my stuff fitted in a 32kg luggage until 2022 or so.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 2:16:48 PM

where in asia is fully furnished? in Japan and China the apartments I was in didn't even come with washing machines, dishwashers, and in one case, AC

by red-iron-pine

2/10/2026 at 2:59:49 PM

Most Chinese apartments come furnished, at least in Beijing. You have to negotiate with the landlord if you want to use your own furniture. I’ve never had an apartment in Beijing that didn’t have a washer machine. No dryer of course, and these are cheap washer machines, you could buy one yourself for 1k RMB or so, well 20 years ago you could.

by seanmcdirmid

2/10/2026 at 2:23:33 PM

Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan was all fully furnished. Most property sites have an option to filter for that.

Also there are a lot of service apartments available too!

by shell0x

2/9/2026 at 5:38:32 PM

There's an extremely low fertility rate paired with a rapidly aging population. When I visited there were endless advertisements for geriatric type care / end-of-life type planning / etc, and a notably older population working quite low wage jobs in a place where everything was crazy expensive, especially relative to its northern neighbor. It felt depressing.

It seems like one of those places that is probably quite nice if you're loaded, but it seems like a pretty rough place if you're not already well off. I was also surprised that many of the stereotypes about 'one fine city' were not quite on the mark. Jaywalking, crossing against a cross-walk light, and various other little infractions were ever-present which left me feeling a bit odd as when in Rome do what the Romans do, but yeah... not gonna risk that.

by somenameforme

2/9/2026 at 6:09:33 PM

Your commentary has me reflecting on my own hometown. I grew up in a wealthy resort and retirement island, the kind of place that is now so expensive I could not afford real estate anywhere on or even near to.

Very aged population relative to the rest of the nation and so during the Great Recession a wave of retirees found themselves owning a home but otherwise impoverished and working service jobs out of desperation. Always was a sad interaction, and working alongside them was often worse. You would never hear the end of their misery, understandable bitterness, and regret.

Nowadays, thanks to the same demographic shifts, those jobs are back in the hands of the youth. Except now it’s all folks who grew up on the island that seemingly will live at home with their parents for the rest of their lives working those jobs. They otherwise would not be able to live anywhere close.

I have to ponder what the next shift in staffing there will look like.

by antonymoose

2/10/2026 at 4:44:51 AM

This is actually the whole developed world at the moment.

Every place is a retirement community now.

by browningstreet

2/10/2026 at 12:40:31 PM

Yes. Annapolis, where I live, is fucking depressing.

by rayiner

2/10/2026 at 4:51:25 AM

Even though it feels depressing right now, I think the post-boomer world is going to be an amazing place.

by typon

2/10/2026 at 5:40:21 AM

There's an interesting aspect of fertility rate that most don't know. They also determine the exact age ratios within a society! Imagine a population has a global fertility rate of 1 (and in Singapore it's even lower, though not globally - yet). That means each successive generation is half as large as the one prior. And we can approximate the age of fertility as between 20 and 40. So now let's start with 1 newborn and we can work backwards from there.

---

1 new born ->

2 20-40 year olds ->

4 40-60 year olds ->

8 60-80 year olds ->

16? 80-100 year olds

---

Just ignoring the 80-100 year olds, we end up in a scenario where you have 6 people in the working age for every 8 people of retirement age. And if life expectancy inches up, then it may be closer to 6 working age people for every 16+ retirees.

You can see this visibly playing out in Singapore right now with their population pyramid [1]. They had a nice solid pyramid in the past, so you end up with a very healthy economy and society - lots of young people for relatively fewer older people. But as fertility rates declined you can see it start to flip, so right now it looks a bit like a vase, and in the future it will be an upside down pyramid.

So basically as the old folks move on, they are replaced by even more old folks. And this never really stops until we return to being societies that are having enough children to sustain ourselves.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Singapore#/med...

by somenameforme

2/10/2026 at 10:31:55 AM

Indeed. And this burden of a top heavy population pyramid is a major reason for not having [more] kids - a vicious circle, which, if left to continue, will result in humanity simply evaporating.

A pretty depressing place, with whole towns and cities abandoned, as the dwindling population huddles closer together. Not just geography though, there would also be a retreat in the arts, sciences, etc as there are simply not enough people to maintain let alone advance these endeavours. Life would be about eking the last out of what was left over from the 'glory days', a sort of slow motion apocalypse.

by somewhereoutth

2/10/2026 at 12:13:19 PM

I really am not following your logic here at all. You're precisely describing what happens from not having more kids.

by somenameforme

2/10/2026 at 10:04:57 AM

Thankfully there's infinite people from other countries who can migrate freely and replace the aging population, right?

(Serious question)

by drekipus

2/10/2026 at 8:30:32 PM

In my observation, there are a lot of unaccounted for and unintended issues that can arise from this.

Where I live, we are going through a lot of this right now (98+% of population growth is from immigration).

Immigrants have more kids than the non-immigrant population, but they do not actually have above replacement rate amounts of kids, so they are going to require more immigrants to take care of them later on. Also, the children of immigrants have non-immigrant level fertility rates. So, it's not a long term, sustainable way to "replace the aging population."

On top of this, immigrants often want to bring their elderly relatives with them when they are possible. I know there are some ways to try to mitigate this (e.g., immigration limits, charging them extra fees on immigration), but at some point there becomes a large enough immigrant voting bloc that this changes. Now you have extra, unaccounted for elderly people that are required to be looked after.

I have no idea what the solutions are, but if we are trying to plug the gap through immigration, it'll require perpetual immigration. Most countries globally are now at below replacement fertility rates, so this opens up a huge can of worms. I'm sure I'm missing something obvious, but it doesn't seem like anything other than a quick band-aid or a solution that's doing anything other than adding "debt" to the issue.

by wheelinsupial

2/10/2026 at 1:14:52 PM

Where do you propose regularly finding hundreds of millions of skilled English speakers of similar values who are interested in permanently migrating to what will be countries clearly in decline?

by somenameforme

2/11/2026 at 10:05:42 AM

India, that's where everyone else gets them. People are just economic units

by drekipus

2/11/2026 at 12:18:02 PM

Even India's fertility rate is now below replacement, and they're increasingly actively working to turn the tide on their brain drain. And India's economy is both already massive and growing quite rapidly. At current trends they'll pass the US within a decade or two. They certainly aren't just this long term sustainable pool of people to draw from.

by somenameforme

2/10/2026 at 7:07:09 AM

We will be them soon enough. Don’t cut your nose to spite your face

by justonceokay

2/10/2026 at 4:49:47 PM

We will be old, not boomers. Boomers are a special generation at a special moment in world history - they made decisions based on the limited amount of knowledge they had about how the world works and while some think those decisions have doomed us forever, I remain optimistic.

by typon

2/10/2026 at 4:57:06 AM

If we don't get into a world war, sure.

by fooker

2/10/2026 at 6:45:51 AM

[dead]

by onetokeoverthe

2/10/2026 at 8:52:56 AM

Nice bit of agism there.

by GJim

2/10/2026 at 12:48:58 PM

It’s more generational-cohort-ism.

by philwelch

2/10/2026 at 1:55:51 PM

Please re-read what was written by typhon and take your prejudice elsewhere.

by GJim

2/12/2026 at 6:55:25 AM

There’s no “typhon” in this thread. Did you mean “typon”? I did reread his comment; it expressed a negative view of a specific generational cohort rather than old people in general.

by philwelch

2/10/2026 at 8:49:09 PM

Boomer isn't an age group, it's a generation.

by xboxnolifes

2/11/2026 at 9:56:48 AM

FFS. Please re-read what was written by typhon. And then take your prejudice elsewhere.

by GJim

2/10/2026 at 5:40:35 AM

The next generation of the ownership class they raised will gleefully usher in the fascism some of their cohorts fought physically and ideologically against, and there isn't the threat of global communism to keep them in check anymore.

I wish I had your optimism.

by heavyset_go

2/10/2026 at 6:16:35 AM

The capitalist will NOT produce the rope that hangs him, but the tech nerd will design, and the labourer assemble, the robot that will replace them.

by Gud

2/10/2026 at 3:10:53 PM

What a shame communists failed every time they gained power.

Oh, and killed 145.000.000 people in the process.

by 837263292029

2/10/2026 at 5:31:27 AM

No it isnt. What are you talking about!?!?!

by edsfdfdfs

2/10/2026 at 5:58:30 AM

wrt the age demographics...

1.theres a constant supply of malaysian chinese who want to migrate to singapore. they're the best, cos they're culturally similar.

2.failing that,a few taiwanese or china chinese can also be allowed to immigrate. singapore is small, and china is huge. only need a few..

wrt living costs.. if u stick to govt subsidised housing(hdb),(public) transport,(hawker) food and healthcare, u shld be spending less as a % of income than the rest of asean on those things. but singaporeans want more, and leave in droves on trips overseas at every opportunity....

by lazylizard

2/10/2026 at 12:40:27 PM

Singapore is small enough to kick the can down the road, but it’s still not sustainable to depend on immigration from other places that also have below replacement TFR

by philwelch

2/10/2026 at 7:27:29 AM

> but singaporeans want more, and leave in droves on trips overseas at every opportunity....

Probably because, as the title of the article states, Singapore isn't cool.

by xyzsparetimexyz

2/10/2026 at 8:05:37 PM

Singapore is the greatest example of failure of public family policies. A whole "Flirting" department (1) was setup since the 80's to push births, starting from a marginally racist approach only to educated women. This only had modest results until now, despite the billions that costed.

Every single such policy in the developed world has failed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Development_Network

by tsoukase

2/10/2026 at 5:13:21 AM

I have to push back on this because you’re basically saying that old people visibly existing killed your vibe, and that jaywalking made you think less of the place.

Heck, in a country with top-tier public housing (17th most affordable housing in the world) and healthcare (2nd best outcomes in the world, 12th highest life expectancy), how are you even sure those older people working jobs are “low paid?”

Maybe you’re seeing older people working because they live healthier for longer in Singapore?

If you work at McDonald’s in Mississippi you are much more low wage than working at McDonald’s in Denmark, especially considering guaranteed paid time off, healthcare, and other quality of life factors. You literally live 10 years longer on average in Denmark (or Singapore) compared to Mississippi. But those two people wear the same McDonald’s uniform.

How can you tell someone is making a “low wage” just by looking at the job they’re doing?

by dangus

2/10/2026 at 5:59:23 AM

The rapidly aging populace is bad for everyone including the old. Isiah 57:1. We should have had the “day of the pillow” that conservatives in Texas were advocating for during Covid.

by Der_Einzige

2/10/2026 at 6:18:08 AM

So your plan is endless growth? When is the population high enough to stop doing that? How is that supposed to work logistically? In what scenario does that not result in societal collapse within a short few lifetimes?

Endless growth and the inevitable planetary destruction/exhaustion from that process isn’t good for anyone, either.

It’s easier to adapt to a shrinking population than one that is too large to sustain with food and energy.

I hate to say it but tossing bible versus around isn’t going to make your case very well. If we want to talk about things that are grounded in reality maybe let’s not cite a book that says god sent bears to kill children who made fun of a guy for being bald (2 Kings 2:23-24).

Let’s be real: the Christian plan is to trash the earth (Genesis 1:26) until rapture comes around to bail out believers who have been dutifully praying and fucking.

Any day now!

by dangus

2/10/2026 at 7:31:32 AM

You're creating a false dichotomy since there's always the obvious option of sustainability which is a fertility rate of around 2.1. And declining populations will likely create a far less sustainable world than increasing would. I described in a peer thread how fertility rates directly lead to the age ratios in society. Low fertility rates means you're going to have a low number of working age people for a large number of elderly people. On top of this, positive fertility rates mean that economies naturally increase in size even if you do absolutely nothing - negative growth rates mean that economies will naturally shrink.

We're nowhere even remotely near our production capacity for food, water, or energy - but we're already facing labor issues in achieving such. And in a low-growth future, which is our future, these labor issues will magnify exponentially. And it's not like you can just pay people more and everybody lives happily ever after - there simply won't be enough people to do everything that needs to be done, even if everybody's willing to work themselves to death. The expectations for what a society can provide will begin to unravel.

And I see no reason not to go sci-fi here because there's every reason to believe it's our future. Earth will not be humanity's only domain. It's practically inconceivable that we won't have thriving off-planet civilizations within a century and realistically - far sooner. And a century of unsustainable growth would be vastly less damaging to society than a century of unsustainable decline.

by somenameforme

2/10/2026 at 4:08:03 PM

The global total fertility rate is already just above your stated ideal rate of 2.1, it's currently at 2.35, so I am really confused at why the comment I originally responded to thought we should all shack up and fuck during the pandemic.

by dangus

2/10/2026 at 4:55:33 PM

After Covid and AI progress, I'm constantly bewildered at peoples' consistent inability to extrapolate the immediate following step in a trajectory.

Global TFR: 1990–1995=3.31, 1995–2000=2.88, 2000–2005=2.73, 2005-2010=2.62, 2010–2015=2.59, 2015–2020=2.52

Our current 1.6 predicament was just at 2.35

by reducesuffering

2/10/2026 at 4:15:47 PM

I don't think you're discussing in good faith there. Obviously what happens in Chad, Nigeria, and so on has relatively little consequence on what happens in America and the Western world in general.

by somenameforme

2/10/2026 at 11:37:33 PM

Please don’t confuse disagreement with discussion in bad faith. I promise you I’m making a serious argument.

It has consequence because trade exists. The Western world imports and exports goods to Africa. If the West loses population it doesn’t mean it loses economic output because there are customers and vendors in other countries with higher growth rates.

Country boundaries are arbitrary.

by dangus

2/11/2026 at 2:29:44 PM

Things do not make themselves. Economies scale with population size in both directions - consumption and production. For instance even India will be overcoming the US economy over the next decade or two. That's in large part thanks to their population size.

And with falling fertility rates within a country you end up with heavily skewed age ratios meaning not only do you have far less people but far less of them are of working age so you get hit with a double whammy there. The age ratios similarly also strongly influence the shape of the economy which will shift to adapt to to the new demographics.

by somenameforme

2/11/2026 at 3:59:03 PM

Meanwhile, Boston Dynamics robots are doing gymnastics routines and speaking in human language using LLMs. I wonder what they’ll be doing in 10 years.

I’m not particularly worried about a labor crunch long term. Labor availability is more detached from economic output and prosperity than ever before. If prosperity had to do with labor and birth rate you’d have to explain why Japan and South Korea have better living standards than Bangladesh and Nigeria.

The automotive industry’s production employee count peaked decades ago, despite making more cars than ever before.

The amount of labor put into a product has very little to do with its economic value. Are your shoes worth more than RAM chips? Because your shoes take way more manual labor to make per item.

by dangus

2/11/2026 at 5:34:42 PM

You're only considering superficial last mile manufacturing of stuff - not the entire labor pipeline involved in processes. Going from elemental silicon to RAM requires an absolutely insane amount of labor across a vast array of fields and specializations. And imminent seeming doesn't mean imminent.

A decade ago full self driving, let alone for commercial trucking, seemed obvious and imminent. Today, it's not only nowhere to be found but, in many ways, feels even further away than it did a decade ago. A robot doing backflips doesn't inherently foretell revolution ahead, especially as Boston Dynamics bots were doing backflips about a decade ago as well. Yeah they look nicer now, and perhaps in a decade we'll be again observing little more than that they look even nicer still.

As for country comparisons, it's not meaningfully possible yet because there's no precedent in modern history for countries going through catastrophic fertility collapse. And it does take some time. For instance Japan is in obvious and severe decline, but they're still at what will be considered 'the good ole days' in the future. So we will get to look on at what's set to come to much of the rest of the world over the coming decades.

by somenameforme

2/10/2026 at 10:55:03 AM

> not result in societal collapse within a short few lifetimes?

Seems like you're more conditioned by apocalyptical Christian logic than you think

by 627467

2/10/2026 at 3:59:13 PM

No? That's the opposite. Christian logic dictates that we don't have to care about societal collapse, because it's prophesied and it's actually a good thing because that's when believers are raptured into heaven. There are accelerationists who actually hope this happens faster.

The population went from 1 billion to 8 billion in the last 226 years. So my question to you is: how many more billions do you really think our planet can support? How long can we support 8 billion?

According to the MAHB, the world's oil reserves will run out by 2052, natural gas by 2060 and coal by 2090. Maybe those estimates are sooner than reality, but still, I'd love to hear about how a solution to running out of fossil fuel energy abundance in the next 25-200 years involves growing the population.

by dangus

2/10/2026 at 12:52:51 PM

We have a whole damn solar system we’re barely even using. Overpopulation is a fake bugbear of small minded bucket crabs.

by philwelch

2/10/2026 at 4:23:17 PM

Thank you! You will have a place in the world post singularity. The person who keeps responding to you won’t.

by Der_Einzige

2/10/2026 at 4:02:04 PM

I'd love to hear about your economical plan to extract resources and populate the rest of the solar system.

It currently costs approximately $4,000 per kg to transport anything into space, that's current bargain basement SpaceX pricing. It also consumes non-renewable fossil fuels to do so.

Let me know how you plan to figure out planetary terraforming, gravity manipulation (so we can live on planets with vastly different gravity), planetary climate management, off-earth mining. How many of these problems have been solved even with 1-5% progress?

Can you name one material we are currently mining from space? Maybe mining space junk orbiting earth, that would be a low hanging fruit, right?

by dangus

2/10/2026 at 4:24:04 PM

Falcon Heavy costs around $1,400 per kg. This is still quite a lot but it can be contrasted against the ~$54,000 per kg from Space Shuttle to understand why the 'hype' around Starship is justified, with the big goal there being to drop another couple of orders of magnitude off the price. At that point costs will be low enough that the door to space will finally be open to full commercial exploitation.

by somenameforme

2/10/2026 at 11:50:14 PM

I’ll buy your argument for the sake of it. We are killing two orders of magnitude of cost.

$14 per kg to get something to space.

Well, right now a gallon of gasoline all-in after extraction, refinement, transportation, and taxes retails for $3-4 in the US.

So that gallon of gasoline isn’t worth transporting to and from space. That gasoline would cost $38 just to import it from space (2.7kg).

Okay, fine, we’re just doing space mining to get stuff like precious metals: platinum, gold, etc. not sure what societal problems that solves, but hey, here we are.

Here’s where I stop buying your argument for the sake of it: you’re telling me we are chopping 2 orders of magnitude off the price, but then you’d have to explain to me how sending material to space is going to be cheaper than UPS Ground Saver retail rates.

Elon wants to launch solar panels into space and send power back to earth…sure fine but why is any utility company considering doing that rather than putting them in a former corn field in Nebraska? The amount of acreage the USA blows on fire ethanol production alone is enough land to power the entire country with terrestrial solar power, the cheapest form of energy on the market.

by dangus

2/11/2026 at 12:48:18 PM

Deep space solar solves the intermittency problem of solar, benefits from an inverse square relationship with the distance meaning you can get way more power per panel, is directly applicable to SpaceX's primary goal of getting to Mars, and so on. The big picture goal is making humanity multiplanetary, of which every SpaceX project can tie into one one way or the other, even the ultimately unsuccessful Boring Company.

As for how sending stuff to space could be cheaper than sending it by some retail delivery service - it's because the economy is extremely dysfunctional on many fronts, especially in the US. You pay dramatically more for a bottle of water in Michigan, home to a sizable fraction of the entire world's fresh water supply, than you do in the middle of the desert in Saudi Arabia. [1]

[1] - https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/bottled-w...

by somenameforme

2/11/2026 at 4:01:26 PM

Batteries also solve the intermittency problem, for less money, and their materials are essentially 100% recyclable. Solar+batteries together are already cheaper than any other form of grid scale electricity production. Entire islands with thousands of people on them have replaced their fuel-based power generation with solar+battery and are seeing lower costs and higher reliability.

If the economy is dysfunctional on earth, why is SpaceX a special snowflake company that is not also dysfunctional? It’s a US-based company. It’s publicly traded just like UPS. UPS has more competitors than SpaceX (FedEx, USPS, DHL, Amazon fulfillment, numerous B2C couriers, international couriers)

Using the price of bottled water is not meaningful to this discussion. Bottled water is a convenience product, the water is not a significant aspect of the retail cost of the product. Bottled water costs $5 inside the airport and $.15 at the Costco 2 miles down the road. The water is not the driver of the cost.

We only have one proven habitable planet and we need to protect it. Multi planetary habitation is some combination of 4 things:

1. Billionaires’ excuse to extract the earth dry for profit.

2. Billionaires’ fantasy to escape the pitchforks at their doorsteps, to build a gated community in the cosmos

3. Billionaires’ pump and dump investment vehicle

4. Billionaires’ science fiction affirmation of their narcissistic belief in their own demigodhood.

by dangus

2/11/2026 at 5:56:58 PM

Batteries don't scale well when you're speaking of extremely high energy needs, especially given their deterioration over time. There's more clever things like artificial hydroelectric, but even that runs into scaling issues. Deep space solar, once established, has nice scaling potential. The inverse square distance:luminosity relationship really opens the door to some truly sci-fi type scenarios.

SpaceX is not publicly traded. It's privately owned and operated, with Elon's motivation behind the company being consistently ideological in nature. The water prices were apples to apples comparisons - the cost of a 0.33 liter bottle of water in an average restaurant.

by somenameforme

2/11/2026 at 2:49:12 PM

> I'd love to hear about your economical plan to extract resources and populate the rest of the solar system.

A good starting point is Gerard O’Neill’s 1977 book The High Frontier.

> It currently costs approximately $4,000 per kg to transport anything into space, that's current bargain basement SpaceX pricing. It also consumes non-renewable fossil fuels to do so.

There are plenty of materials in the solar system that aren’t at the bottom of a gravity well. It’s just a question of developing ISRU infrastructure. The fossil fuel problem is already solved; all of the newest rockets use methane fuel, which can be produced without fossil fuels.

> Let me know how you plan to figure out planetary terraforming, gravity manipulation (so we can live on planets with vastly different gravity), planetary climate management, off-earth mining. How many of these problems have been solved even with 1-5% progress?

Half of those aren’t serious problems. You don’t need to terraform anything to fit quadrillions of people into the solar system because you can just use small bodies like the moon as material for space colonies. You stated yourself how expensive it is to get out of the gravity well; why go back down into another one? The space colonies—which can be built with known materials, at scales approximating that of a US county—would rotate, providing artificial gravity through centrifugal force. ISRU (“off-earth mining”) is a very active field of research.

The obvious next step is to industrialize the Moon and build a mass driver out of lunar materials that we can use to ship lunar materials into cislunar space for construction. The best discussion of how to do the practical next steps that I’ve encountered is Ian Long’s YouTube channel, Anthrofuturism. (https://youtube.com/@anthrofuturism). The best starting point there is “How To Develop The Moon” (https://youtu.be/WZN2xXMb28g), largely based on his book, also titled How To Develop The Moon (https://a.co/d/0dn84hJa).

There’s a beautiful future available to us if we can escape the bucket crabs.

by philwelch

2/11/2026 at 4:27:04 PM

Why does everyone in this thread keep talking about bucket crabs like they’re in some kind of groupthink cult? I don’t know what the fuck anyone means by bucket crabs.

Living in space is essentially like living in the ocean with all the same environments challenges. We don’t do that and never have because it doesn’t really make logical sense, we have better options available. It lends the question of “why do that?”

Why? Why do we want to live in space colonies? To what end?

This planet will be habitable for tens of thousands of years at the bare minimum if we take care of it, certainly moreso than the vacuum of space.

by dangus

2/12/2026 at 6:53:50 AM

> I don’t know what the fuck anyone means by bucket crabs.

If you put one crab in a bucket, it might climb out. If you put many crabs in a bucket, they will actually stop each other from climbing out. This is an extremely common metaphor.

> Living in space is essentially like living in the ocean with all the same environments challenges.

Maybe we’ll do that too someday.

> This planet will be habitable for tens of thousands of years at the bare minimum if we take care of it

With a very limited amount of space and resources. We got into this discussion because of concerns about overpopulation. The Earth has plenty of natural resources and can almost certainly handle a much higher population than it has now, but exploiting the rest of the solar system will make it last even longer and allow significantly more material wealth for every person alive even at a significantly higher total population.

by philwelch

2/10/2026 at 7:46:02 AM

>I hate to say it but tossing bible versus around isn’t going to make your case very well

Not if you actually read the verse, it's a relevant, experience driven philosophical statement.

by hattmall

2/10/2026 at 11:35:18 PM

Are we reading the same verse? I read it and it doesn’t seem relevant at all. It almost looks like the commenter pasted the wrong book/chapter/verse.

by dangus

2/11/2026 at 6:10:38 AM

You have to read the correct translation. The one that specifically references why it's good to die young

by Der_Einzige

2/11/2026 at 4:36:32 PM

Well, that’s stupid. It’s not admirable to die young.

My grandma lived 96 years of a happy, healthy, enriching life. She got her college degree at age 60. She had a beaming smile when she played with her great grandchildren. She enjoyed the company of her husband well into her 90s. She lived independently until the last month of her life.

And there we go with the bible, you gotta read the correct telephone game translation of it and interpret the right way for it to make any bit of sense.

Nobody can just accept that it was written in a human developmental era that most of us wouldn’t relate with in any way.

For example, it was considered a blessing to die young and “go to heaven” in an era before surgical anesthesia. Better than living a long life with ailments that a modern doctor can treat in an afternoon.

We didn’t even get basic antibiotics until less than 200 years ago.

by dangus

2/11/2026 at 4:00:51 AM

I don't know. I thought it made sense in that the previous commenter was lamenting the "boomers" and how everything will be better when they are gone. Without actually realizing that their isn't anything inherently problematic with boomers, it's just that they are the first generation that didn't reproduce at a replacement level. Making the aged a larger demographic than than the youth. That problem, however isn't going away, and is in fact magnified in each subsequent current generation.

by hattmall

2/9/2026 at 5:07:22 PM

I think Singapore's immigration policy is still interesting and relevant to western countries, but it's true it's also kind of similar to the UAE.

Essentially it's (relatively) easy to get work visas for areas where there's a genuine shortage but difficult to get permanent residency and almost impossible to get citizenship.

That's still a very different policy to what most western countries have right now.

The UAE has the most extreme version of this so the milder Singaporean version is less interesting as an example.

by ifwinterco

2/10/2026 at 4:50:54 AM

Singapore has also somehow maintained a supermajority Chinese population consistently since the 1970s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Singapore (77% in 1970, 74.3% in 2020). That is even though the predominantly Muslim Malay population has had much higher total fertility than the Chinese population since 1980: https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Total-Fertility-Rate-Per....

It seems like Singapore uses its immigration system in a deliberate way to maintain the political power of the dominant cultural group.

by rayiner

2/10/2026 at 5:41:37 AM

> Singapore has also somehow maintained a supermajority Chinese population

It’s not really a secret that Singapore uses ethnicity based quotas when granting PR and citizenship to maintain their demographic composition.

by unmole

2/10/2026 at 7:35:13 AM

  It’s not really a secret that Singapore uses ethnicity based quotas when granting PR and citizenship to maintain their demographic composition.

Or be like Malaysia. They don't even bother to keep it a secret to maintain Malay governing power and unfair advantage.

Cheaper gas only for Muslim citizens, not Chinese/Indian citizens. A company must hire Malay Muslim no matter what. Plenty of other rules that favor an ethnicity.

by aurareturn

2/10/2026 at 6:04:52 AM

and theres no shortage of well educated malaysian chinese running away from bumi policies...

by lazylizard

2/10/2026 at 8:04:40 AM

I saw a post once from a white guy with a wife and two kids (I think also white) who was confused why he was having so much trouble getting Singaporean PR despite contributing so much to the economy.

Like bro... you are the wrong race, it's that simple, shouldn't be too hard to understand.

I'm not making a moral judgement on whether that's correct or not but it's just how it works

by ifwinterco

2/10/2026 at 2:28:49 PM

A filipino friend of mine moved to Australia after being denied PR in SG, mainly due his race.

As a white person, I’d probably never get PR too but I think it’s good that they maintain the current percentages, otherwise the country would turn unrecognizable like Germany or France.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 5:52:25 PM

Yeah as a white guy who quite likes SG it's a shame but I completely understand, "permanent" is a long time

by ifwinterco

2/10/2026 at 5:10:35 AM

This. My mental image of Singapore was always boring guys in suits working for soulless banks. At least Wall Street bankers go wild on drugs and know how to party. Singapore bankers are men who, when feeling adventurous, have a sip of wine here and there and women who push dogs in strollers.

Having been to Singapore many times, I've realized my mental image was pretty accurate. There's no real art scene and even mentioning anything that slightly goes against the grain of Singapore's tight, tidy, and strict regimens doesn't just not appeal to the people, it'll actively infuriate them. A hint of rebellious nature defines cool. Singapore doesn't have a single drop of that within its entire national borders.

It's like North Korea with money and good PR. At least a lot of North Koreans sneak in a little rebellion when they know nobody is watching, even if it's minor stuff like watching illegal foreign TV shows. Singapore is the type of place where your neighbors would report you if such a thing became illegal, instead of saying "Hey bro, let me borrow those DVDs after you're done." It's a great place to make money. Then once you have it, leave to live a little.

The country is so against cool it even has a designated free speech corner that doesn't allow free speech and had its usage hours limited from 7 AM to 7 PM and limits speech to 4 languages only: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speakers%27_Corner,_Singapore

by kdheiwns

2/10/2026 at 5:47:59 AM

Close to a true perspective, especially if you came as one of those suits. There is soul in singapore, it's just actively co-opted by the govment or actively suppressed. You have to actually live here to see it and have friends who are not expats or mainland chinese (which is hard I think for most foreigners who come), it definitely isn't the same as the soul that you see in america or europe, I guess. The work life (a bit more chill than Japan or Korea but still harsh like the asian norm) doesn't help.

by noobermin

2/10/2026 at 11:21:18 AM

In Russia I noticed that it took barely 10 minutes with stranger before getting into a discussion of philosophy, literature, meaning of life, etc. (or how their soul ached for something)

I never saw this Singaporean soul even in deepest darkest ang mo kio.

It was low key creepy how shallow the locals were. They'd chat about gaming, shopping, grinding and food, food, food but very rarely anything deeper. even after knowing them for years.

I went to some "artistic immersive theater" there one time (there was an event like this maybe once a year?) and even there the first third was a girl monologuing about her love of kpop.

Most countries fit in the middle of these two somewhere but these two countries really stood out to me in their extremes.

by pydry

2/10/2026 at 7:12:48 AM

> There's no real art scene and even mentioning anything that slightly goes against the grain of Singapore's tight, tidy, and strict regimens doesn't just not appeal to the people, it'll actively infuriate them.

Somewhere I read that the government once went around arresting theater troupes and the like that were seen as too leftist, but I can't seem to find the specific info. Does anyone know what I'm talking about?

by tdeck

2/10/2026 at 2:36:02 PM

You do not seem to like a rules based society. I’d have no problem renouncing my German citizenship and become Singaporean. I just want stability, safety, good food, good bars, excellent transit, low taxes and excellent internet.

by shell0x

2/10/2026 at 3:45:32 PM

Germany has always had a massive and influential art and music scene. It's been the source of fine cinema. It's globally known for raves, dabbling in drugs, and wild fashion. I encounter Germans all around the world hiking up mountains in freezing temperatures while wearing nothing but shorts and sneakers and smiling while doing so. Germans are known for their strict rules when it comes to the day to day, but they very much know how to unwind.

Singapore has none of these. The national pastime is talking about how much money you have and how much you love having money and can't wait to have more money. And the money never goes towards interesting experiences. It's the same as Dubai. Shopping and international chains and thinking that means class. It's boring and makes East Germany seem like a good time.

by kdheiwns

2/11/2026 at 8:36:20 AM

Singapore is also a very young country though, so it's not fair to compare to Germany. You do have a point though that there is not much out of the box thinking. I found that to be higher in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

by shell0x

2/9/2026 at 5:35:49 PM

Do they get to vote? Also in general elections? Are they typically organised in unions?

by cess11

2/10/2026 at 6:02:07 AM

There are elections but a combination of gerrymandering and honestly just good governance by the ruling party has kept them in power. People genuinely like the PAP. To the extent people vote for opposition candidates, most people would readily admit they do so only to send a message to the PAP. Most Singaporeans do not sincerely want to be ruled by anyone else yet.

Unionisation in Singapore is very different than the rest of the world. There is one very large union (the National Trades Union Congress, NTUC) but it mostly works with the government and the PAP and has a bit of a revolving door with some PAP MPs serving as leadership in NTUC. Wildcat strikes are illegal, and striking is generally not allowed. I think the last sanctioned strike by NTUC was in the 80s. The union does still generally represent workers in disputes between employers and the government and does other work on behalf of workers (trainings, some welfare, it runs the largest grocery chain that at least theoretically is supposed to be a social enterprise and a cooperative), so most members I think accept the arrangement, for what it's worth.

by noobermin

2/10/2026 at 11:02:32 AM

The ruling party has perfected the art of using legal and social pressures to fracture any competing parties if they get too big.

They have a jealously guarded media monopoly and viciously crack down on opposition bloggers by suing them into bankruptcy using absurdly strict libel laws.

As a last resort they steal any policies which make the opposition popular. This is actually an underrated means by which Singaporeans exert democratic pressure on the government but it makes it pretty demoralizing to be in opposition.

There is a national union but it is controlled by the government. Striking is illegal iirc, but membership will get you discounts on your shopping.

Singaporeans are pretty apolitical on the whole, which is how the PAP seems to like it. Theyre not like Americans - not split into two herds who are trained to hate one another.

by pydry

2/10/2026 at 8:16:46 PM

Sound like Singapore's system rewards competence + stability, and that makes it hard for opposition to scale, because the incumbents can absorb popular ideas while keeping institutional advantages.

That’s demoralizing if you’re doing party-building. But the flip side is: it means citizens do have leverage, just not always in the form of “replace the government.”

by czl

2/9/2026 at 5:13:30 PM

The UAE still murders gay men just for beeing gay. Besides the lack of morality this affects 7 % of all men worldwide.

Im not sure if UAE really be an exciting place and thus would someone migrate to it if you care about culture and stuff.

by snowpid

2/9/2026 at 5:49:24 PM

All gulf states have abysmal gay rights, but are you sure they are executing gay men?

by breppp

2/9/2026 at 6:06:03 PM

I'll checked it and you are right. It is just law and practical not done.

But what is worse: Law which does not matter, because the elite will ignore it anyway or threatening gay men to kill them but currently not doing tit.

anyway, not a place a emigrate.

by snowpid

2/9/2026 at 7:00:16 PM

I agree, without even talking about gay rights, I think both the UAE and Qatar have a legal system and an immigration system I wouldn't want to be subjected to.

Generally true for most of the world outside of the West

by breppp

2/10/2026 at 2:50:07 PM

If you are gay don’t go there. As an expat who is not affected, my main concern is that i just don’t want to pay taxes

by shell0x

2/9/2026 at 5:25:31 PM

Yes, Singapore will execute people for different reasons, not for being gay.

by marcosdumay

2/9/2026 at 6:13:23 PM

Yes, mostly for drug trafficking and murder. You could in theory argue that drug trafficking is kinda comparable to being gay [1], but the capital punishment is only for huge amounts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Singapor...

[1]: I mean, in my book consensual trade between two grown up people is closer to consensual sex between two grown up people than it is to murder. That said, there is still some difference.

by notpushkin

2/10/2026 at 11:09:36 AM

They also applied the death penalty to somebody with the mental capacities of a child who was being exploited as a drug mule.

by pydry

2/10/2026 at 12:50:01 PM

That’s a pretty big fucking difference though.

by rayiner

2/9/2026 at 5:40:50 PM

Any real recent examples of this, specifically in Abu Dhabi or Dubai?

by nurumaik

2/9/2026 at 5:47:39 PM

There aren't any examples for Dubai (afaik), on record. In the UAE, 2015 was the last execution for homosexuality. There was a deportation in 2017 for maybe cross dressing?

Either way, I would consider the UAE an exceptionally unsafe place to visit.

by Supermancho

2/9/2026 at 5:54:20 PM

Any source for the 2015 case? All I found was executions of pedophile rapists

by breppp

2/9/2026 at 6:07:17 PM

I think you're right. While the UAE doesn't execute people for pedophilia, per se, the homosexuality element was what allowed for it.

by Supermancho

2/10/2026 at 1:01:10 PM

Many traditional cultures don’t really distinguish between homosexuality and pedarasty. That distinction, or at least the cultural recognition of a distinction, is largely a distinctive artifact of the sexual revolution, a western phenomenon.

by philwelch

2/11/2026 at 5:02:04 AM

I don't think that was the case, the executions I saw was for rape and murder of four and eight year olds

by breppp

2/11/2026 at 2:19:05 PM

Right, my point is that if they were men raping four and eight year old boys, they may very well have been convicted of sodomy rather than child rape like they would in some Western countries.

The state law in Washington even had a similar issue. Bestiality was prohibited by the sodomy statute, which the state repealed in its entirety as a gay rights thing. After the Enumclaw incident the legislature scrambled to re-criminalize bestiality.

by philwelch

2/10/2026 at 9:05:43 AM

UAE.. powered by de facto slavery.

by burnt-resistor

2/9/2026 at 6:43:39 PM

Singapore was never "cool" as long as I remember in Asian expat circles since 90s. It's like the nice clean manicured places where boring expats who enjoys boiled potatoes and chicken breasts without spice settle. Dubai without all the high quality sin.

by maxglute

2/10/2026 at 4:52:19 AM

There's the fact that they created a first world economy out of nothing, unlike the Gulf countries that just found oil under their feet.

by rayiner

2/10/2026 at 5:43:52 AM

That's very true.

Singapore has done extremely well economically.

But it's not cool. That's something else.

Tokyo, for example, is cool, fashion, music, films and computer games come out of Tokyo.

But that's very hard to say of Singapore.

Perhaps it's like Luxembourg and Lisbon.

Admittedly the link at the top is from Marginal Revolution where 'cool' may mean economically successful and interesting for policy makers.

by sien

2/10/2026 at 6:54:30 AM

Serious people TM. It's not a knock, no shame in SG being regional Ned Flanders.

by maxglute

2/10/2026 at 7:08:49 AM

The regional Sy Ableman.

by tomjakubowski

2/9/2026 at 9:20:02 PM

I thought Dubai was Dubai without all the high quality sin.

by badc0ffee

2/9/2026 at 10:20:58 PM

Tame Orchard towers and four floors of whores never produced dubai chocolate tier of memes. Singapore is Disney with death penalty. Dubai is Disney with Minnie Mouse scat play. Hilariously, both great places to raise kids if you stick to the main attractions.

by maxglute

2/10/2026 at 4:56:19 AM

> Hilariously, both great places to raise kids if you stick to the main attractions.

I haven't heard of many examples of people having profoundly positive impacts on the world being raised in either of those two countries. Of course, this will be impacted by their size and in the case of Dubai, it's recent ascendancy. Still, it makes me very wary of that claim.

by deaux

2/10/2026 at 6:51:20 AM

I mean in the practical sense -safe, good amenities, schooling, access to migrant nannies. Great place to raise kids =/= raise great kids. Especially for expat bubbles.

by maxglute

2/10/2026 at 7:40:51 AM

My idea of a great place to raise kids is one that optimizes the likelihood of them becoming great kids. I don't think they fit the bill. Admittedly, I'm not sure where in the world would rank highest, but I do think both wouldn't score high.

by deaux

2/9/2026 at 7:23:01 PM

“Disneyland with the death penalty” [1]

—William Gibson

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disneyland_with_the_Death_Pena...

by virtualritz

2/11/2026 at 5:57:29 PM

> "Perhaps", he speculated, "Singapore's destiny will be to become nothing more than a smug, neo-Swiss enclave of order and prosperity, amid a sea of unthinkable ... weirdness."

I think, reading this today, it probably describes what people like about the place.

by eli_gottlieb

2/10/2026 at 4:33:35 PM

Yes, still spot on - there's a reason that description lives on so many years later.

Barbaric city states like Singapore should be abolished or taken over and reformed.

by JCattheATM

2/11/2026 at 1:09:56 PM

I love how you're opposed to the death penalty for provably societally damaging criminal activites, but violent imperialism on those that don't agree with you (which would almost certainly entail many deaths)? Completely OK.

by HighGoldstein

2/9/2026 at 5:58:55 PM

>Yet today’s American political right is not very interested in technocracy.

That is a deeply weird statement to make in 2026.

by lbrito

2/9/2026 at 6:36:44 PM

I think you're (understandably) interpreting "technocrat" differently than what the author intends and what it's historically meant.

Technocrats form the foundation of the so-called "deep state" that Trump rails against: unelected bureaucrats - scientists, economists, doctors, researchers, engineers, statisticians - controlling low-level government policy (ideally) on the basis of data and knowledge of their particular field.

What it doesn't mean is "a government run on the insane whims of coked-up techno-utopian billionaire tech CEOs", which is what the current right seems to be interested in.

by wk_end

2/10/2026 at 4:51:39 AM

Right, authoritarian oligarchy is much closer to what certain parties desire here in the States. Is unfortunate that the prospective oligarchs chose technology as their vehicle (of both oligarchy and authority, via surveillance, of course), and it's even more unfortunate that we let them do so.

by voidhorse

2/9/2026 at 6:08:14 PM

> Singapore is a much more democratic country than most outsiders realize

Yeah no.

In Singapore you have a single party which has used it's constitution, laws, courts and media control to enforce a defacto one-party state for 60 years. Singapore citizens can (and do) vote but those votes have absolutely zero chance of changing anything.

Is it technically democracy? Well they vote so yes? Is there any chance at all of peaceful regime change through voting? Technically yes, in practice? Probably not. I would expect extreme suppression and HK style riot crushing. They have been doing it quietly for decades, targeting and legally destroying/bankrupting any opposition to the PAP.

So the only real difference vs say China is that while both are authoritarian regimes the Chinese didn't bother with a mechanism to pretend you can throw them out.

To be clear, I don't object to their form of government. I think it works for them and thus it's completely ok. If anything I find Singapore a really safe and efficient place and visit frequently.

I do object to people pretending it's somehow a liberal democracy though, that just ain't the truth.

by jpgvm

2/9/2026 at 7:43:34 PM

People also voted in USSR. DPRK has a 99,9% voter turnout that modern OECD countries could only dream about.

Voting is only a part of the democratic process, but is meaningless taken alone.

To add to what you say, Singapore is not a democracy, Lee Kuan Yew's son ruled the country for 20 years after his death, and his successor was chosen by him.

by Saline9515

2/10/2026 at 6:16:41 AM

those votes have every chance of changing everything.

its a first past the post system.

but fact is they always have majority of the popular vote. i dont think it ever declined below 55%. and at best they get 60+%.

there's always a large proportion of singaporeans who want the change. just never enough of them, yet. and maybe there might never be, if most singaporeans are happy with things as they stand.

by lazylizard

2/9/2026 at 5:28:08 PM

TIL detention without trial is a thing in Singapore [^1], ministers love to brag about increasing the severity of detention without trial [^2], and that the longest someone was held in detention without trial in Singapore was 23+9 years [^3]. That person was never charged.

[^1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_Law_(Temporary_Provis...

[^2]: https://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/politics/my-views-on-...

[^3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chia_Thye_Poh

by budududuroiu

2/9/2026 at 5:36:46 PM

There’s a reason William Gibson called it “Disneyland with the Death Penalty”

https://www.wired.com/1993/04/gibson-2/

by 46493168

2/9/2026 at 5:50:26 PM

Yes and whenever I see anyone gushing about Singapore that's the first place my mind goes.

You can keep your 1000 different Instagrammable spots, I'd rather go some place that is a little more into democracy and reasonable policing.

by FatherOfCurses

2/10/2026 at 6:09:43 AM

the modus operandi is to live and work, and maybe raise and educate ur kids in singapore. and go jb kl bkk hcmc jkt or wherever else to play.

by lazylizard

2/10/2026 at 10:56:33 AM

Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Ho Chi Minh City, Jakarta

jb?

e: oh, Johor Bahru, interesting

by bdsa

2/9/2026 at 7:56:24 PM

> reasonable policing

Policing SOPs in East Asia (incl. Singapore) is different than policing SOPs in the west. Typically people are warned, often multiple times, that they are in danger of experiencing the less kind side of local law. Once the switch is flipped, this gentle hand becomes an iron fist.

I will bet dollars to donuts that the person who was held without charge for decades (mentioned above) was completely not surprised that they were severely punished. They may not have liked the punishment, they may not have agreed with the opaque process, but they almost certainly can’t say that they didn’t know it was coming.

by csa

2/10/2026 at 5:01:16 AM

You quoted "reasonable", but nothing what you said has any effect on reasonableness.

If someone warns you that they're going to murder you if you post another 5 comments on HackerNews, and keeps you up-to-date with every comment you make, nothing about those warnings makes the subsequent murder after your 5th comment more reasonable than if they hadn't given those warnings.

by deaux

2/11/2026 at 2:05:40 AM

> You quoted "reasonable", but nothing what you said has any effect on reasonableness.

Being notified that you are or have been breaking the law and being told that there will be severe consequences if you don’t stop seems reasonable to me.

It may not be how we do it in the west, but it’s hard to argue that this can’t be perceived as reasonable.

Let me give you an example that opened my eyes. It’s one of many, but it’s one that you may have heard of.

Michal Fay was caned in Singapore in the 1990s. I was so put off by this, that I swore never to go to Singapore. I thought that the punishment far exceeded that which could be justified by the crimes he committed (petty stuff like vandalizing cars).

Then, within a 6 month period, I met two families who lived as expatriates in Singapore at the same time, one in the same community.

They all said that MF was a pariah. They also both said that he and his family had been given gradually escalating warnings over a short period of time, with the next to last one being “MF needs to leave Singapore now”, and the last one being “you (his family) and MF need to leave Singapore now”. Apparently the job was too good, so the family stayed. We know the rest of the story.

A decade later, I met a woman who worked in Singapore at the time, and she expressed similar sentiments.

While I still think the punishment was excessive (even reduced to 4 lashings instead of 6), I lost all pity for MF and his family. They knew what was coming, and they either didn’t understand the culture they were in, or they didn’t believe what they were told.

I’ve see similar types of policing (with warnings and an explanation of potential consequences) happen in Japan, China, and South Korea. IMHO, it works the way they want it to (mostly as an early deterrent, with very little prosecution actually taking place). This is one reason why there is such a high success rates of criminal convictions in places like Japan — if they make the effort to book you, they have overwhelming evidence, usually collected when the criminal has been warned.

We may not like the laws, we may not like the punishments, but we shouldn’t be surprised by the outcomes.

> If someone warns you that they're going to murder you if you post another 5 comments on HackerNews, and keeps you up-to-date with every comment you make, nothing about those warnings makes the subsequent murder after your 5th comment more reasonable than if they hadn't given those warnings.

Great strawman.

Posting on HN is not against the law (at least where I am).

by csa

2/12/2026 at 9:40:44 AM

> Posting on HN is not against the law (at least where I am).

If my scenario were law, it would still be entirely unreasonable.

Besides, law is an entirely fluid concept in general, including in Singapore, but really anywhere, to varying degrees. The US has recently been making this incredibly clear for even the blindest to see, but it was already the case before.

by deaux

2/9/2026 at 5:58:01 PM

That's one of my favorite pieces of writing by Gibson, because he cites Neal Stephenson's "burbclave" concept. Which, to me, is like the literary equivalent of those times when a famous musician or band (including but not limited to the Barenaked Ladies and Don McLean) performed the Weird Al version of their own song.

by bitwize

2/9/2026 at 6:49:09 PM

Yes, and it’s probably why I often misremember it as being written by Stephenson.

by 46493168

2/9/2026 at 5:38:36 PM

Well, to get the death penalty you have to be charged. I actually think Singapore laws on what could get you the death penalty are pretty clear, and you'd be stupid to violate them. Being detained without trial seems scarier imo

by budududuroiu

2/10/2026 at 6:03:28 AM

You need not violate them knowingly. Just having drugs in your bag placed clandestinely by someone else could get you in trouble. Along with being held without trial and risk of death penalty, this is scary.

by ivell

2/9/2026 at 11:36:56 PM

Regarding [2], what arguments did that politician put forth and what are your thoughts on the strength of those arguments?

by jhanschoo

2/9/2026 at 5:45:30 PM

after reading the wiki article I'm quite certain he was saved and kept alive to continue his work. someone was out for his head but didn't have enough reach.

but that's just an assumption based on stories in the good old Soviet Union.

by funkyfiddler369

2/9/2026 at 5:56:33 PM

Detention without trial is also a thing in the UK. Legally limited to 6 months but extended in practice if you are Irish or advocate against the genocide in Palestine. Ask the people of Palestine Action UK.

With the growing fascism all over the world we will see that kind of thing more often.

by cardanome

2/9/2026 at 6:30:04 PM

https://www.gov.uk/arrested-your-rights/how-long-you-can-be-...

by asplake

2/9/2026 at 6:35:49 PM

Reality:

> This trial marks the first attempt in Britain to treat political property damage as equivalent to terrorism - an unprecedented and dangerous expansion of state power. Under the current Labour government, many defendants will have spent nearly two years behind bars before even standing trial.

https://www.cage.ngo/articles/trial-begins-for-first-six-of-...

by cardanome

2/9/2026 at 7:05:26 PM

Everyone in this thread is conflating/misunderstanding various things and seems a little misinformed.

"Detention without trial" is a thing in the UK, as well as the US, Canada, and many (most?) other countries, even those considered non-authoritarian or whatever, for lots of crimes, not just politically convenient ones. This isn't a new thing because of growing fascism, it's literally the distinction between "jail" and "prison", or what the bail system is for. Court systems don't have the capacity to try everyone immediately upon arrest, and in various ways, look to balance that with the right to a speedy trial, the right to a presumption of innocence, justice, and public safety.

(I'm not making any judgement on the balance Britain is striking in this particular case, which sounds bad!)

But what OP is pointing out as problematic in Singapore's case is 1) detention without even being charged with a crime, which is what the UK government website linked above says is forbidden beyond a relatively short time frame and 2) the absence of any kind of a right to a speedy trial.

by wk_end

2/9/2026 at 7:09:23 PM

Trial delays and court backlogs in the UK are indeed terrible, as few people here would disagree. They are not without court oversight (remand hearings, etc). They affect many people – rape victims being a notable example – and I do not believe that these systemic problems are politically motivated.

by asplake

2/9/2026 at 6:08:43 PM

[flagged]

by snowpid

2/10/2026 at 5:00:01 PM

It was never 'cool'. It's a barbaric totalitarian state that hides it well. It's one of the few countries I truly don't want to ever support by spending money as a tourist there.

by JCattheATM

2/10/2026 at 8:46:00 PM

It’s still a significantly better place to live than America or Europe though.

> It's a barbaric totalitarian state that hides it well.

The same can be said about the Us which stirs up wars in other countries, kidnaps other countries presidents and has ICE arresting kids.

I’d pick Singapore over the US any day of the week.

by shell0x

2/11/2026 at 6:49:40 AM

That's a matter of opinion. The US has its faults, but overall it's quite easy to have a very high quality of life here, and to live a huge variety of different lifestyles if that suits you.

by namlem

2/10/2026 at 9:06:48 PM

> It’s still a significantly better place to live than America or Europe though.

They keep a small, 'racially pure' population, ban any negative press, kill any undesirables....sure it is.

> The same can be said about the Us which stirs up wars in other countries, kidnaps other countries presidents and has ICE arresting kids.

The US under Trump has changed a lot, this is true, but in most states it's not putting people to death for minor reasons and actually allows enough freedom to make love worth living. You'd have to be an NPC to be happy living in Singapore IMO.

by JCattheATM

2/9/2026 at 5:57:09 PM

Singapore was never cool, they were always the most authoritarian place on Earth without an actual dictator in charge.

by moffkalast

2/10/2026 at 4:00:30 PM

According to the Travis Bickle clone army who are leaving comments here today, that's a wonderful thing.

by thomassmith65

2/9/2026 at 5:21:27 PM

It hasn't been cool for a long time. My dad was offered Singaporean citizenship in the 1990s despite then being an Indian national but decided to immigrate to the US to work in tech in Silicon Valley instead and raise us. This is a pretty common story among Bay Area Chinese and Indian Americans who immigrated during that era.

In the 90s and 2000s, Singapore's value add was that it could act as a door into China, India, and ASEAN due to expansive trade and investment treaties, but why would I want to build an R&D center in Changi staffed with PRCs and Indians when I could just hire them directly in Shenzhen or Bangalore.

After China committed to being hands-off on HK business and contract law in the 2000s, SG lost some value as it didn't have the same connections that HK had legally speaking to enter the Chinese market.

SG continues to remain the best place to incorporate a business in Asia, but just because your lawyers and holding company is in SG it doesn't mean your operations, operational headcount, and capital expenditures is there.

by alephnerd

2/9/2026 at 5:59:52 PM

This changed back to the advantage of Singapore when China cracked down on HK.

by lostmsu

2/9/2026 at 10:28:19 PM

For the average HKer - absolutely. Most of my HK native friends and colleagues who could immigrated to London, SG, NYC as a result.

For a business - it depends on how dependent they are on ExChina capital markets or customers.

If you were a company that was primarily and overwhelmingly operating within China, after the changes there was no incentive not to shift most of your operational and executive staff to Shanghai.

If you weren't one of those, then shifting to Singapore makes sense.

The issue for Singapore is Indian companies have started making the same decisions as those China First companies, so Singapore has lost it's comparative advantage within Asia, as Western FDI remains prominent but is increasingly either routed directly or (in India's case) through challengers like the UAE or London.

by alephnerd

2/10/2026 at 12:08:58 AM

Jane Street moved a lot of people out.

by lostmsu

2/10/2026 at 1:11:43 AM

IK. Jane Street - like other Western financial institutions - has been de-risking out of China for a couple years now.

That's why I wrote the comment below:

"If you were a company that was primarily and overwhelmingly operating within China, after the changes there was no incentive not to shift most of your operational and executive staff to Shanghai.

If you weren't one of those, then shifting to Singapore makes sense."

Jane Street isn't dependent on Chinese markets. It primarily operates in Western markets with speculative bets in Asian markets excluding China such as SGX and NSE+BSE in India (albeit with a massive regulatory target on their back).

China has done infringed on it's agreement with the HK people, but not all capital in Greater China is Western and is increasingly Chinese originated.

by alephnerd

2/10/2026 at 4:49:51 AM

I don't think Singapore was ever cool. In fact I'd say up until a few years ago most Americans didn't even know Singapore existed. Why would they? Now maybe that's changed with Crazy Rich Asians, Tiktok, and the "Senator, I'm Singaporean" meme. For SEA, Thailand was always the cool kid on the block.

by booleandilemma

2/10/2026 at 5:07:52 AM

hmm. I would say for most Americans it was Japan. Sushi did numbers.

Thailand was for sex tourism.

Singapore was cool to government/political types because Lee Kuan Yew really did pull off a miracle.

by ineedaj0b

2/10/2026 at 7:08:43 AM

If you read to the end of my comment then you'll see I was only considering Southeast Asia, but if we talk about Asia in general then yeah, we gotta mention Japan ^_^

by booleandilemma

2/9/2026 at 5:32:29 PM

OP's critique feels like a celebrity economist's variant of those travel magazine pieces that tell us why Zermatt, Phuket or Nantucket is no longer a "cool" vacation spot. On some sort of momentary buzz meter, sure.

But the factors that help Singapore be an Asian or often global hub in so many respects are still running strong, no? Worrying about whether a couple dozen X/Twitter legends are hyping you today feels silly.

by GCA10

2/9/2026 at 6:14:19 PM

Think it's more looking at the trend for Very Serious Political/Economic Commentators to suggest it as a model to emulate in long form articles than the Twitterati, but yeah, it's explicitly asking about opinions rather than whether there's anything about it that's actually broken down. Which is, relatively speaking, a nice place to be as a country.

Cowen is focused mostly on the US commenteriat, but the trend is similar in the UK, where "we should totally be like Singapore" peaked around Brexit, under the delusion idea that all we needed to do to emulated the success of the city state that founded ASEAN two years after declaring independence was leave the EU.

Meanwhile HN generally forms its opinion from a decades-old William Gibson article lamenting that it wasn't cool enough to write cyberpunk about :)

by notahacker

2/9/2026 at 5:40:18 PM

> celebrity economist's

That is what MarginalRevolution is. It's fairly heterodox by most standards, but not in the good way.

> the factors that help Singapore be an Asian or often global hub in so many respects are still running strong, no

Nope.

If I can now IPO in China or India with Singapore level valuations and attract Singapore level deal sizes, why would I as a Chinese or Indian want to dedicate significant capital in Singapore beyond what is needed to build an operating shell to interface with western capital markets?

Similarly, if I'm GS, JPMC, Citadel, etc and I'm seeing significant dealflows in China and India, I should concentrate on building an organization within their borders as much as possible - which is what they have been doing since the mid-2010s.

Singapore will remain a major financial hub, but it is losing it's relative advantage to other hubs within Asia.

by alephnerd

2/9/2026 at 8:24:03 PM

India and China don't have the low tax stable capitalist system thing that Singapore has. In some ways it's advantage has increased now Hong Kong is part of China.

by tim333

2/9/2026 at 10:36:32 PM

> low tax stable capitalist system thing that Singapore has

I can say from personal professional experience that historically businesses are domiciled in Singapore primarily for us investors in Western capital markets to enter China, India, and ASEAN.

For capital that is already located in China, India, and parts of ASEAN (primarily Vietnam), that becomes less attractive, especially because China, India, and Vietnam all operate SEZs that have aligned with western corporate law or have BITs signed with major western financial hubs (eg. Pudong SEZ, GIFT City SEZ), so we don't need to route via SG to the same degree we did 20 years ago.

Additionally, if we want to exit our investments in China or India, we have no choice but to list on a Chinese (including Hong Kong) or Indian stock exchange because no other Asian market has comparable trade volume, which makes exits difficult.

Finally, what differentiates Singapore from the Dubai or London? Depending on where you are investing in Asia, you may end up getting much more preferential access from either of those two instead of Singapore.

This is why Singapore has lost it's mojo - it can't differentiate itself as a financial services center and Singapore never really had a strong innovation sector.

by alephnerd

2/9/2026 at 6:42:01 PM

I think the UAE point is crucial - in many things, including freedom and basic rights, they are worse than Singapore. Now that most of the west (as the article says) treats civil rights and press freedom more like Singapore does, the right shifts right. I am not in the US so can't comment on the immigration point but I perceive it exactly the other way around with heavy handed immigration enforcement being worse than most expected.

by janpeuker

2/10/2026 at 3:43:09 PM

The West, or just the USA?

by nicbou

2/9/2026 at 5:19:43 PM

I think it is due to China. I remember Singapore was a large financial center for Asia, but China's rapid growth overshadowed Singapore.

I also think Hong Kong is going through the same thing, plus I believe China is trying to make Shanghai into its main Finance Center, letting Hong Kong's center fade away.

by jmclnx

2/9/2026 at 5:27:58 PM

SG's value-add was as a door into China (and India and ASEAN). China has strict capital controls so it makes FDI risky.

During the 1990s when there were open questions about HK's status, a lot of the business community (and at least 10% of HKers) immigrated to SG to operate there.

During the 2000s, the PRC made some good faith attempts at assuaging investor sentiment in HK, and that slowed the business and financial services outflow from HK to SG as HK had added linkages to Mainland China that SG would never have.

Now that I can IPO or M&A in China and India with Singapore level valuations, I have no incentive to retain more than a minimal operational presence in Singapore in order to act as a capital funnel to the others.

by alephnerd

2/9/2026 at 5:32:37 PM

And during the 2010s-2020s the flow from HK moved back to SG since China started their major changes in HK.

by re-thc

2/9/2026 at 5:35:51 PM

I'd say it went 50-50 Mainland-Singapore.

By 2019, if you were a Chinese company that only intends to operate within China, you had no reason not to move legal and leadership operations to Shanghai.

On the other han, I'd you were a foreign investor, HK de facto become "yet another Chinese territory" which meant it's not a good hedge for an ExChina/China+One strategy which is executed in ASEAN or India, which made Singapore become somewhat attractive.

Basically, the only loser was HK.

That said, this is all business and financial services - no one was actually dedicating serious effort building sustained R&D capacity in either HK or SG when you can hire the people who you would have had to apply PRs (no one who is worth hiring would accept a work visa when they could work for an American company and L1/2 to America) for directly in China, India, and increasingly Vietnam.

by alephnerd

2/9/2026 at 5:38:24 PM

> If you were a Chinese company that only intended to operate within China, you had no reason not to move legal and leadership operations to Shanghai.

Where's the example where you're a Chinese company with most revenue in China (for now) but do sell elsewhere and anyhow, there are lots of reasons to not 100% stick to China,

e.g. gaming companies have moved to Singapore in masses (at least some capacity) due to time and time of gaming crackdowns and censorship

by re-thc

2/9/2026 at 5:55:18 PM

Gaming and Social Media in China is slightly different given how significant western capital was in the sector in the 2000s and 2010s compared to other portions of the Chinese tech industry.

For example, the whole ByteDance/TikTok imbroligo is due to Susquehanna trying to exit it's Chinese investments which are locked within China.

During the 2019-23 period, boards in startups that had Western investors increasingly demanded that either Chinese investors buy them out or that they shift domicile so an alternative path to exit could be found.

by alephnerd

2/9/2026 at 5:27:50 PM

It's hilarious that we think of Singapore as competing with China where China has 1000x more people.

Singapore is pretty impressive.

by ergocoder

2/9/2026 at 5:36:30 PM

Look at the map, all ocean travel between East Asia and India/Europe basically has to go past Singapore. They've been a trade and financial center with a substantial chinese population for a long time.

by woooooo

2/10/2026 at 7:59:01 AM

> Look at the map, all ocean travel between East Asia and India/Europe basically has to go past Singapore.

Same can be said about Sri Lanka.

by miyuru

2/10/2026 at 10:10:14 AM

Its less funneled although most straight lines will approach the southern tip of India. Singapore is one of 2 possible ways through Indonesia and its the shorter one.

by woooooo

2/10/2026 at 11:41:40 AM

China could only compete with Hong Kong after they crippled Hong Kong hard enough.

by charlieyu1

2/9/2026 at 5:33:13 PM

Well, 230x.

by badc0ffee

2/9/2026 at 10:36:00 PM

well, ok, less impressive

by ergocoder

2/9/2026 at 6:19:57 PM

Hong Kong has been in a different spot since 2023 when the Chinese government targeted some of the biggest due diligence companies and shut them down, substantially disrupting all contract driven commerce at that time. Avoiding random corruption driven crackdowns like that is one of the main reasons companies prefer alternatives like Singapore.

by m0llusk

2/9/2026 at 6:56:43 PM

SH onshore, HK offshore still. PRC bigger economy than entire region SG serves, if PRC wills HK to be finance hub larger than SG then that's what HK will be, on mainland volumes alone. One thing Singapore has over HK is it's land endowments though pathetic is slightly less meagre, SG managed to carve out nice industrial sector for 20-25% of GDP, something HK couldn't compete with PRC and IMO heavy reliance on finance fucked it over. Hence HK being integrated into greater pearl river after NSL slap down cowed all the nativists.

by maxglute

2/10/2026 at 9:06:35 PM

I think low fertility rate is related to high Internet use. You could argue its about high education.

by acd

2/10/2026 at 5:43:31 AM

Singapore was never "cool." It was always a shopping mall masquerading as a city.

by SanjayMehta

2/10/2026 at 4:29:13 PM

I'd say it lost it's coolness when it started public flogging.

by stevetron

2/9/2026 at 5:32:09 PM

Cool? Out of all the major world commercial hubs, wasn't it always the hottest and muggiest?

by arduanika

2/9/2026 at 5:51:27 PM

Everywhere you need to be is air conditioned, which is pretty cool I guess...

(Humidity's high but peak temperatures aren't particularly extreme; it's just never cold)

by notahacker

2/9/2026 at 10:37:36 PM

That's just south east asia in general.

by ergocoder

2/9/2026 at 5:35:32 PM

Ironically, UAE and Qatar have nicer weather in the winter than Singapore.

by axus

2/9/2026 at 5:42:39 PM

Singapore is on the equator, so winter is not even a well-defined concept there.

by lisper

2/9/2026 at 6:10:43 PM

What a strange premise. Aside from the brief period of infamy around the Michael Fay case (mid-90s, a teenager caned for acts of petty vandalism), when were Americans ever paying attention to Singapore?

The author keeps referring to "right-wing" this and that, so presumably he is buried too deep in some weird political subculture to realize that his question makes little sense to the rest of us.

by marssaxman

2/9/2026 at 6:18:27 PM

Tyler Cowen used to blog about Singapore monthly, and now he does not. He reflected on why he doesn't. He admitted that he doesn't because its not cool to people in power. I find that a funny admission because I long suspected that academia's basic function is to suck up to power and justify whatever decisions the elite make.

by jpadkins

2/10/2026 at 4:51:00 AM

Academia is a huge place, and no, its basic function is absolutely not to suck up to power. Every academic I know sees their function as the opposite, even if few take advantage of the limited protections afforded by tenure to speak truth to powers

But Tyler Cowen’s calling in particular is ABSOLUTELY to suck up to power.

by directevolve

2/10/2026 at 11:44:25 PM

Thanks, that's helpful context about the author.

by marssaxman

2/10/2026 at 5:19:30 AM

Occasionally, you can read a comment and realize you can skip evaluating it and instead enjoy the sultry writing of the NYT itself.

by ineedaj0b

2/10/2026 at 1:29:23 PM

"Especially in light of some of the burgeoning anti-Asian sentiment, for instance from Helen Andrews and some others."

Huh? I had to look up Helen Andrews. From Wikipedia: "She wrote that wokeness is fundamentally female, as it prioritizes 'empathy over rationality, safety over risk, cohesion over competition.'"

(And coincidentally you have "Rice Theory: Why Eastern Cultures Are More Cooperative" on the front page and I can see how in her mind there is a line between "wokeness" and "cooperative".)

by JKCalhoun

2/9/2026 at 5:13:43 PM

> Singapore’s free speech restrictions, whatever you think of them, no longer seem so far outside the box. Trump is suing plenty of people. The UK is sending police to knock on people’s doors for social media posts, and so on. That too makes Singapore more of a “normal country"

That seems like it should make Singapore _more_ cool, at least my personal theory is that this changed a lot of perception of China (at least in some parts of gen z social media, "it's a very Chinese time").

by chillacy

2/10/2026 at 9:04:50 AM

Uh, it was never "cool" to me because of its brutal and unreasonable authoritarianism like caning people for trivial infractions.

by burnt-resistor

2/10/2026 at 6:02:58 AM

I think Singapore will always scare (in particular) Americans.

Rule-following, restrictive, collectivist, inclusive, intellectual, anti-corrupt, high-functioning ...

A politician like Donald Trump would never come out of Singapore.

And also Singapore is very much an inspiration for modern day China.

by chvid

2/10/2026 at 6:07:46 AM

I think the only thing you're wrong about is modern China is a lot more about face which also is part of Singapore's psyche but nowhere near as much. While there might be some book-cooking, it's nowhere near as bad as the blatant kpi fudging that provincial governments do in China. The CCP also is far more authoritarian than (yes) even the PAP. You do not have random ministers getting disappeared after they fall out of political favour with Xi Jingping.

by noobermin

2/10/2026 at 7:07:26 AM

OP likely just pointing out Singapore used to train a lot of CCP officials something like 50k (I think slowed last 10 years). One of the SG uni governance program is colloquially called "mayor's class", joke is it's overseas branch of central party school. LKY met every PRC leader in some sort of mentor relationship. Obviously national scale between PRC/SG different, hence SG more of model of mayor/municipal level.

by maxglute

2/10/2026 at 5:40:26 AM

This article is so strange. It's interesting, but all he seems to care about is what right-wingers think. Who cares what they think? I guess that's all to whom Tyler Cowen wishes to appeal.

by noobermin

2/10/2026 at 11:39:20 AM

I used to be an occasional MR reader, but stopped visiting lately because of this. When it became obvious how the US presidential race will end (basically after assassination attempt) Cowen's tone heavily shifted. Even the facade of objectivity went through the window. Now most of his writing is spent on defending the indefensible. Shame, his early takes helped shape my world model.

by paintbox

2/9/2026 at 5:16:36 PM

[flagged]

by thisisauserid

2/9/2026 at 6:00:47 PM

Yoghurt will not give you a decade in prison for littering or chewing gum.

by moffkalast

2/9/2026 at 5:07:04 PM

[flagged]

by sthkr

2/9/2026 at 5:20:10 PM

Man, imagine the biggest complaint that people can come up with re: a country is that you don't like the local english pidgin's politeness marker.

by Octoth0rpe

2/9/2026 at 5:33:11 PM

this kinda comment damn jialat sia. come outside settle

by budududuroiu

2/9/2026 at 5:01:37 PM

we call it the rich version of north korean

by yanhangyhy

2/9/2026 at 5:43:01 PM

Who is "we"?

While the ugliness of Taiwanese justice (or lack thereof) makes it unappealing to me, from the other issues mentioned in these threads and the recent 3 year sentence for killing a little girl - https://jakartaglobe.id/news/sixyearold-indonesian-girl-kill..., I'm not sure it rises to the most troubling qualities of NK. eg The population doesn't starve en masse, no familial dynasty, and there is no alternate-fictional history.

by Supermancho

2/9/2026 at 5:49:04 PM

> Who is "we"?

many chinese people, it's kind of joke but still..also true on many levels.

> I'm not sure it rises to the most troubling qualities of NK

its run by a dictator from the begining, with many strange laws to tell the people not to do this and not to do that. the major difference is that Singapore is pro-west (and pretend to be neutral) so no trash talk from the western media and its portrayed as a 'democracy'

by yanhangyhy

2/9/2026 at 6:19:43 PM

This is the "dictator" that you're allowed to run for election against and the "no chewing gum" bylaws Singaporeans sell T-shirts joking about the system to foreigners, right?

Try doing that in mainland China...

by notahacker

2/9/2026 at 9:14:28 PM

There are many ways to keep yourself (and your son, after, like in SG). You can use arbitrary force and secret police, as it is the case in DPRK or China.

Or you can use the fact that you basically own the State to pit everything against your political opponents. There are various ways to do this, and at different intensities. SG's PAP is famous for using lawfare against political bloggers, newspapers and political opponents who question their rule.

Western democracies, where the selectorate is currently fearing for a populist takeover has started to do the same: German politicians filed more than 4,000 defamation cases, vague "hate speech laws" allow to selectively try your opponents, the State funds compliant press and NGOs, and so on. The EU functions in a way that democratic oversight and popular will is so dilluted that it isn't a real constraint, while keeping the "democratic" varnish and some legitimacy.

At least in SG, DPRK or China, things are clear and not hypocritical, maybe it's better for everyone.

by Saline9515

2/9/2026 at 6:21:08 PM

so is USA and Trump, why people call Trump a dictator?

by yanhangyhy

2/9/2026 at 6:31:11 PM

Trump tried to reverse the election last time he lost and enjoys suppressing protests with military units. But yeah, he isn't literally a dictator, just would like to be

by notahacker

2/9/2026 at 6:53:39 PM

i failed to understand the enthusiasm for politics memes.. it's a good point, i just dont undertand the fuss. in the end, you want to something changes in your life, not only something like 'i can joke about our system'. if it can change the system and the policy, i totally support them. but i dont see many cases. If i have to choose one, i will always choose the gum.

i read so many pepople complain the ICE on rednote and on reddit complain Trump and jokes about him, i just don't see the changes. Does Trump retreat any of his major polices? If not, are people just lives in the bubbles?

by yanhangyhy

2/9/2026 at 6:11:49 PM

" so no trash talk from the western media and its portrayed as a 'democracy' "

Please provide sources

by snowpid

2/9/2026 at 6:14:00 PM

please give me a link said singpore is not democary and its run by a dictator

by yanhangyhy

2/9/2026 at 6:21:40 PM

https://freedomhouse.org/country/singapore

Now your turn

by snowpid

2/10/2026 at 6:21:38 AM

singaporeans can read that. in singapore. we can access the rsf.org website too.

by lazylizard

2/9/2026 at 6:26:51 PM

ah shit.. i foget the essence of free world and free speech: you can speak and express, but we can make sure nobody hears you and your voice doens't matter..

you win! this website must make a huge diffrenece for the people all over the world or the western world so people think of singapore as non-democracy sometimes.

by yanhangyhy

2/9/2026 at 5:28:31 PM

I'll take "begging the question" for $500.

by LiquidSky