These changes were in response to many Singaporeans' complaints that they saw little or no benefit in being citizens here. An oft-heard version of this complaint is that the Singapore government treats foreigners better than citizens. This change, Khaw said, was part of an effort to "treat visitors well, but citizens better" -- an assurance that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong gave a week earlier at a People's Action Party conference.

According to the Straits Times, employers currently enjoy an advantage by hiring foreign workers over locals, because the state helps out with their medical bills. This acts as an economic distortion that leads to employers preferring to hire foreign workers rather than local ones. The minister said he expected employers in future to buy medical insurance to cover the full, unsubsidised medical bills incurred by their foreign workers, including domestic maids.

I find this terribly simplistic. As it is, employers have to pay a monthly "foreign worker levy" to the government, with rates ranging from S$100 to S$470 per month (depending on the type of job). Where does this money go? What is the justification for collecting this levy if not to pay for the social costs of having these foreigners in our midst?

Some might suggest that the levy is justified by its serving as a control mechanism, to limit the number of foreigners brought in. While the levy, if high enough, can have this effect, it is obvious that it is not the primary mechanism, since it is not quantitatively unlimited. It's not as if anybody can obtain a work permit to hire foreign workers so long as he pays the levy. The primary mechanism is administrative approval: the government still has various quotas for various industries. Thus even if the levies are reduced to zero, there'd still be no explosion of the numbers of foreign workers.

At this point, let's put a few numbers together. Let's assume that 700,000 of the 875,000 foreigners are work permit holders, subject to the foreign worker levy. These would be the ubiquitous construction workers, sanitation workers, shipyard workers and domestic maids we see everywhere in our city. Let's assume the average levy their employers pay is S$200 per head per month.

This means the government collects about S$140 million a month from levies, or about S$1.68 billion a year.

Now look at the first sentence of this essay again. Khaw said the withdrawal of medical subsidies from foreigners and the scaling back of subsidies from PRs would save the government S$36 million a year -- about 2% of what they collect in levies.

Don't you think we need to sit back and think about proportionality?

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I've said it before, I'm not proud of the way Singaporeans treat foreigners who contribute to our economy. In my view, we treat them quite shabbily, making no pro-active efforts to plan for how to house them, for example. Every now and then, we hear horror stories about foreign workers and maids crammed by the dozens into a poorly ventilated room.

Even more often are cases of employers cutting short work contracts, leaving them stranded here with unpaid wages. And let's not forget unscrupulous agents who charge absurdly large commissions for finding them jobs that turn out to be entirely fictional, after they have arrived.

Earlier this year, there was a proposal -- revolutionary by Singapore standards -- to give domestic maids one day off per month. See the article Inhumanity towards maids. Believe it or not, it was a private initiative, which the government was careful not to offer full backing for. Based on reports in the newspapers, many employers of maids thought it was too much to ask of them!

And while we're on the subject of maids, the average monthly wage they get is about S$300. Compare this with Hong Kong, where in May this year, the government raised the mandatory minimum wage marginally, to HK$3,400 (S$680). Singapore does not have any mandatory minimum wage. Heck, we don't even have mandatory rest days.

Foreigners are what keeps this place humming along. Nothing would be built if we didn't have foreigners building them. Our streets would be buried in trash if we didn't have foreigners cleaning up after us. Our birthrate would probably fall even lower if there were no domestic maids available.

It speaks very poorly of us to be so ungrateful. It's also very telling how irrational we are, if we think they compete with us for jobs.

Perhaps our ire is really focussed, not on the low-paid workers, but on the better-paid foreign professionals. Now, those are the jobs we want and the damn foreigners are taking them away from us, some may say (not that I agree with them either). Yet, I don't see how the withdrawal of subsidies will significantly impact on them. At that level, the customary practice is for employers to buy medical insurance anyway, in order to pay for a better class of hospital ward. With the withdrawal of subsidies, the insurance premiums may go up somewhat, but it won't be all that significant to the employers.

That is to say, even if you believe that foreign professionals are taking jobs away from Singaporeans, this move over the medical subsidies will do nothing to redress whatever imbalance you think there is.

Hence, the government's move is little more than symbolic -– for Singaporeans. None of us are treated better by this move, but the lower-paid foreigners are most likely going to be treated even worse. Realistically, we can expect most of their employers not to purchase medical insurance for them if they have a choice, or if they are required to do so by law, then you can expect the premiums to be taken off their wages.

We should not be proud of this. If foreigners are here contributing to Singapore, we have a moral duty to treat them fairly, and to provide for basic human needs. For a mere 2% of the levies we collect, how can we begrudge them medical subsidies?

 
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Why is it that Singaporeans complain there is no advantage to being citizens? On the face of it, you could say that's because we enjoy no economic advantages. If you take that reading, then cutting off subsidies for foreign workers may satisfy some primal instincts to put some distance between them and us. But as I said above, I think it's immoral to be so punitive. And if it makes this place less attractive for foreigners to come and work, then in the long run, we only hurt ourselves.

Another argument often heard is the disadvantage that comes out of having to do National Service. All male citizens and 2nd-generation PRs have to serve 2 to 2-and-a-half years in the military, police or Civil Defence, followed by 13 more years in the reserve.

The grumble goes: "Foreigners don't have to do this, yet they enjoy all the subsidies."

This is not a simple matter to deal with. Our geopolitical reality is such that it's hard to imagine how we can provide for defence without National Service. In any case, many other countries cope quite well with a similar scheme, e.g. Switzerland, Israel, Taiwan and South Korea.

Yet there is one very cheap compensation for having to do National Service: a genuine right of participation in the political life of Singapore.

Our advantages in being Singaporean do not have to be purely economic. In fact, if we only think in terms of economic plusses and minuses, then it's a pointer to a rot setting in, not just as Singaporeans, but as human beings. Life aspirations are more than just money and selfishness is not a badge worth wearing.

We should treat foreigners who contribute to Singapore fairly and compassionately, as near as economic equals as we can afford. But in return for the duty of citizenship -– National Service -– we should have the political rights of being a citizen. In reality, not just in name.

Ah, but there's the rub.

Perhaps it's easier for the government to boast of how we're going to treat foreigners worse, to make us feel good, and how we're going to save $36 million, than to talk about political rights.

© Yawning Bread