By Ng Jing Song
3 RSIS academics propose an immigration bonus to get Singaporeans to accept foreigners.
A few academics from the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) recently proposed an Immigration Bonus to “[alleviate] the unpleasant consequences of immigration by making the benefits of having a foreign presence in Singapore more tangible." “[The] bonus will serve as an important signal to Singaporeans of how their fortunes are intertwined with foreigners as the Immigration Bonus will increase and decrease in tandem with the number of foreigners allowed into Singapore," the academics say.
The bonus would be drawn “from a revenue pool of immigrant labour levies”, and "would be largely akin to the GST Bonus doled out periodically to Singaporeans."
This proposal, titled "An immigration bonus for Singaporeans? - Making the foreigner more acceptable", employs shoddy economic logic and, more egregiously, blithely ignores the vulgar influence of money on this sensitive matter.
The simple economic logic that the handouts can offset the costs of a more claustrophobic society cannot hold. First, it assumes that the “costs” imposed by an additional foreigner on each Singaporean remain constant. This is not necessarily true. The increased jostling on our beleaguered public transportation system and the heightened scarcity of residential space give rise to a stuffy climate of frustration that gathers momentum. Frustration burgeons exponentially. The monetary benefit the Immigration Bonus extracts from the additional foreigner would presumably be constant. From a crudely clinical perspective, the benefits fail to match up to the costs.
Second, flinging dollars at an individual is a slovenly way of dealing with practical concerns. Public policy endeavours to overcome collective action problems: conundrums that individuals acting alone cannot resolve because of free-riders, informational deficits, etc. The costs of a more crowded Singapore manifest themselves in our buses, trains, residential estates and other public spaces. A more prudent use of the said pool of money would tackle these matters, whose solutions elude individual Singaporeans clutching meagre sums from the Immigration Bonus.
Perhaps cognisant of the wanting rigour in the economic analysis, the academics noted that the Immigration Bonus banks on its symbolic message. Yet, the symbolic resonance, contrary to the quixotic prognosis by the academics, is not positive. It is vulgar.
Blogger Jentrified Citizen retorted: “Can Singaporeans be bribed to accept more foreigners?” Bribing denotes a transaction that is transgressive. The exchange of cash for acceptance corrupts things that are precious to us. To unpack what these things are, we can examine matters through the foreigner’s lens.
Money symbolically displaces the crucial social relations between the foreigner and Singaporeans. The relationship between the foreigner and a Singaporean becomes congenial to the extent that direct monetary benefits accrue to the latter.
This relationship is shorn of its meaningful components: the universal greeting of a beaming smile, the embrace of our multiracial landscape (including loving the strong aromatic whiffs of curry), the vernacular in our coffee shops when ordering our beverages…
Such components demand a patient curiosity from the foreigner, who might be less keen on investing much effort having paid off her dues through the Immigration Bonus.
Even for the foreigner who commendably cultivates communal bonds with Singaporeans, the Immigration Bonus injures her sincere efforts. The academics predicted a symbiotic relationship to emerge from the Immigration Bonus; the more foreigners the merrier Singaporeans should be. This overlooks a critical phenomenon: the induction of new Singaporeans.
Were Singaporeans such simpletons, new citizens would shatter this symbiotic relationship. When a foreigner who has contributed to Singapore for a while and epitomised values that we cherish as a nation, she would hopefully be offered a citizenship and be part of Team Singapore. However, this would be to the absolute chagrin of the Singaporean conjured by the academics. This new citizen would no longer be chipping into the pool of immigrant labour levies. In fact, she would be receiving the coveted Immigrant Bonus.
At the point that the Immigrant Bonus successfully contorts our minds to perceive relations in transactional terms, new citizens become a menace.
We can take heart in the intuitive distaste many would have against the Immigration Bonus. Perhaps the only valuable element in this proposal is the more acute realisation that what we cherish – communal ties, the values ensconced in our citizenship, etc. – cannot be for sale.
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