The leaders havnt got a plan so the rich poor divide is getting greater and the economic plan is still the same as when Britain handed over, low tax to attract foreign capital and make sure there is cheap labour for those foreign companies.
Thats a hard pushed propganda that has run its course, more then once foreign companies have been quoted in the press that the graduates are just not employable what has your education system done to them.
That leaves no room for the majority of locals and the only place they can vent is in the voting which is moving toward the opposition in each election.
The problem is the old farts that just remember the great job that the government did from the beginning, undertandable as their lives just got better and better, so keep voting that way but they are ignoring the future of their grandchildren and the people in the gov today are not those from LKY’s group.
Now you have the situation with young people with some get up and go, leaving as they can see that a lifetime working in another country will put them well ahead than if they stay.
I hear it from lots from friends that are at the top of global companies that local staff see their opposite number overseas and are jealous of their lifestyle when they were always told you were better off in Singapore because its a low tax place.
They have woken up that although their colleague in Australia/New zealand/USA etc pays more tax but yet owns a huge house ( in their eyes) 2 cars and a boat but is on the same salary and they are still living with their parents in a HDB.
Here’s a history of the economic reality
The gov own a huge chunk of the economy
The joke is they need the GLC’s ( Government Linked Corporations) as a place to put the Singaporeans.
The gov power comes from the military so they keep plucking them out and dropping them into postions they are wholly unskilled and un qualified to do.
After several high profile technical failures on the SMRT, the underground railway and the bosses falling on their swords, the public was made well aware that the bosses were from the military and they just replaced one with another, the world is laughing.
The locals have a great joke…
" Son why did you join the military" “Because what I really wanted was a train set”