Skip to main content

The Singapore Budget over the decade

18 Feb 2020 3 min read

Bookmark (1)
ClosePlease loginn

No account yet? Register

Singapore’s Budget over the years has supported Singaporeans through the tough times and the good times. A variety of measures and policies have been introduced and improved to meet the evolving needs of Singaporeans – whether it is targeted support for households, businesses or workers.

Here’s a look back at the highlights of the Budget in the past decade.

2009: The Resilience Package

In 2009, Singapore was facing a recession due to global economic decline. To support Singaporean workers and businesses, the Government rolled out a Resilience Package, one of the key initiatives in the Budget. Under that package, the Government introduced Jobs Credit to sustain jobs for Singaporeans and Skills Programme for Upgrading and Resilience to help Singaporeans stay employed.

2010: Transforming the economy, supporting the workforce

As Singapore moved toward transforming the economy to provide quality jobs and higher incomes, the Government committed S$1.1 billion a year over the next five years in the form of tax benefits, grants and training subsidies to support the national effort to raise productivity.

2014: Supporting our Pioneers

To commemorate the contributions of our pioneers, $9 billion was set aside for the Pioneer Generation Package. This package ensured that the healthcare needs of Pioneer Singaporeans were taken care of with benefits that cover outpatient treatment, Medisave top-ups and medical insurance for life, for eligible seniors.

2015: Commemorating Singapore’s Jubilee

Singapore marked its jubilee year with a series of measures for its people. In conjunction with SG50, every Singaporeans aged 25 and above were given a $500 credit to upskill and upgrade their knowledge under SkillsFuture scheme.

To support the bottom 20 per cent of Singaporeans aged 65 and above, the Silver Support Scheme was set up to disburse quarterly cash benefits for eligible seniors.

2016: Transforming our Industries

To meet the demands of an interconnected, diverse and complex global economy, a $4.5 billion plan was launched to transform Singapore’s industries and enterprises.

The Industry Transformation Programme allows for integration of the restructuring efforts of industries; having sector-focused measures and deeper partnerships between the industry, government and also among industry players.

2017: Greater Plans for Sustainability

This year saw more emissions and water-related measures to ensure quality environment.

To meet the increasing demand and strengthen the resilience of the water supply, the Government announced that it will update water prices to reflect the latest costs of water supply.

Since ratifying the Paris Agreement in 2016, Singapore announced its intention to implement a carbon tax which will be applied upstream to power stations and other large direct emitters.

2018: Strengthening Social Support

More than $200 million was pledged to various enhanced education schemes such as increasing the annual Edusave contributions and raising the annual bursary quantum for the MOE Financial Assistance Scheme for pre-university students.

Measures were also announced to strengthen revenues to meet future needs such as raising the Goods and Services Tax (GST) while at the same time ensuring more support to the lower-income households and seniors through enhanced GST Vouchers and  an offset package which will also benefit middle-income households.

2019: Healthcare in Focus

The Government launched the Merdeka Generation Package for those born in 1950s to help them defray their healthcare cost. This package is expected to cost the Government more than $8 billion.

With rising healthcare needs and an ageing population, the Government expanded the Community Health Assistance Scheme (CHAS) to cover all Singaporeans with chronic conditions, regardless of income. Lower- to middle-income Singaporeans who are orange CHAS card holders will be able to get subsidised costs for common illnesses.

In addition, a total of $5.1billion will be put a new Long-Term Care Support Fund, to fund CareShield Life subsidies and ElderFund.

2020: Advancing as One Singapore

The Government announced $5.6 billion package to help Singaporeans tide through as they face the challenge of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-2019) earlier in the year.

This includes a $4 billion Stabilisation and Support and package that will help enterprises defray wage costs of their workers.

To help Singaporeans manage with cost of living in the economic slowdown and the COVID-19 outbreak, the Care and Support Package for Households will distribute $1.6 billion in cash and vouchers.