Singapore has been put on notice. The city-state has long wrestled with how to lift the birthrate. But despite an array of incentives, couples aren¡¯t showing much interest in larger families or having any at all.
The challenge is shared by most successful nations. Ultralow fertility is a byproduct of rapid development and elevated living standards. South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and China all have rates of fertility well below 2.1, the level at which demographers say a society reproduces itself.
Leaders are far from comfortable with the trend. Singapore is still crunching the numbers for 2025, though they are unlikely to improve much from the prior year. "I¡¯m not likely to give good news,¡± Deputy Prime Minister Gan Kim Yong told a conference recently. His interviewer joked that Singaporeans sometimes show more interest in acquiring pets than bringing bundles of joy into the world. Another minister at the same event called the fertility profile abysmal.
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