Is Singapore still based on equality? | Regardless Of Class | Full Episode

In half a decade, Singapore achieved dizzying heights of success. We're one of the wealthiest countries in the world and a high-tech powerhouse. Our rags to riches story is unparalleled.

But recently, the attention has turned to our rags and riches stories. I'm John Apothecary, chairman of the national body to promote harmony here in Singapore, called One People, God SG. Over the past two years, I've confronted the controversial issues of race and religion. But I've come to realize that those are not our biggest fault lines. Today, it is the divide between the haves and the have-nots that is creating the most tension. In the most expensive things, yeah, the most popular. So let it get cold. Children are starting to have different accessories. Our sofa. I'll be speaking to people who face this divide every day. I don't have meaningful friendships with people from the other side. Therefore, de facto, and be confronted with some uncomfortable realities. Most of the people in my questions live, look down on us. Anything that we are quite stupid. Is this conversation uncomfortable? Tina Cesar, we're always told that Singapore is a city of opportunity. We can make it so long as we work hard. I want to know if people still believe this is true. If more handouts is not the answer, then what is? Do you think that education is effective at social leveling today? This is gonna be an explosive issue because it challenges some of the values that we hold so firmly and daily values like fairness, like equality, and meritocracy. We're a nation with a founding ideal, but there'll be no such thing as a second-class citizen. But today, have we lived up to that standard? For every single boring.

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8 a.m. and I'm off to meet someone standing at the edge of the class. Devon Walmart Rookery is the security guard at this luxury condominium. How do people treat you as a security guard? Defense depends on which students at. We see this kind of hush things are useless and stupid. Ah, sometimes even mental barrier is not hopefully there's something here. Oh, and then you see useless security. And then so when you first started, how did you feel about this? I was a bit short. Well, how come they treat us this way? But after a while, I go sighs to sites and everything. After she show me where everywhere, some sort of seem so I get used to that. When that kind of thing happened to me, then I can just bend my anger or anyway, so I just keep it to myself. But what you stand on them? I think I would say, yeah, it's like DLA. No, I say they're treating us. Oh, like not human. But by a chilly day, I like 15 people. I state that security guards are one of the lowest paid professions in Singapore. The cost of one square foot in this condominium is sugar. Ease entire month's salary. Shukri's story is not new. I hear them all the time in my work as an MP. From waiters, security guards, cleaners, salespeople, they tell me about a deepening class divide. I asked some of the people I met to write down their stories, and I want to find a way to get other people to hear their stories too. How often are we guilty of creating an us-versus-them? We got some stories here. Real stories from real people. Pick one and read it.

I have been lying to you. Say that my mom is a busy businesswoman. The truth is, I'm afraid to let you know that my mom works as a beer aunty. I grew up hearing nasty things said about her. You came from an upper-class society. Even know about my mother? I know I am invisible. I have to get used to this and learn to stop caring. I feel upset to be treated with contempt, as if you look down on me. VI, so old and useless already. I just sweep the floor and then you rubbish from the top of the block. Then after that, residents complain. The blame is always on me. A stick cleaner, son of a beer aunty, a car collector, buy a McDonald's kina. Oh, well, okay. Wow, okay. There is something. Well, what's the, what is the OL waffle? Because it comes to a stickiness. I don't really see them much, especially so. I do expect. Let me under if we shade it. What do you think when you see them like they can't like, oh, it is so hard to see this. To see, I mean, there was a people at us. It's just that if they're destined to be cleaners, we use our eyes as if we are apart. They go about doing their own work. I go about living, mind my mask. I feel sad. Words like, I just got deliveries down. I mean, after all, she's my mom now. So I can really do watch. Ah, so you think you've ever looked at someone that way? Of course, I definitely have many times when I was young. But when my dad took those jobs, and I sat in the delivery truck for the first time with him, I cried because my gosh, my dad is one of these people that I used to look down as equal. Now my dad is that. That's that's why I said. How does that make you feel? I mean, upon reflection, I think sometimes I myself don't always acknowledge the cleaners around me, the people who clean our streets, to be working our tables. Yeah, I've learned that it's the little things that cause a sense of separation. A look or a throwaway comment. And it's the social cues that slowly widen the divide.

In the last year, class divide became a buzz phrase.

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Research reveals the gap is more pronounced than ever, and it's dominating many of our national discussions.

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I'm going to meet with columnist drama whom. I want to know if the average Singaporean cares about the class divide. We whom compiled all her articles on income inequality and class divide into a book, Singapore Disrupted. Why should we all care about this? So much of this thing, apply identity has been built on the idea that, you know, we can all have a fair call. That you can do well in life regardless of your family connections, your well, who you know, and so on. But you want to preserve that going forward? Of course, not just preserve, but, you know, entrench it, you know, enhance it. Yeah. So it becomes a problem if we are increasingly having a society where people who are really privileged and with access to resources are able to pass on those advantages with their children. What does a divided Singapore look like? Very unhappy one, full of resentment, you know, full of envy, full of talk about the divide between the the best and the rest, full of criticisms or, you know, of the elite, so on. Totally sexual politics, you know, the Athena society could become quite on carbon alone. Now, is it over here? I, I would have to throw the question back at you because you are a policymaker, right? And a governor bull Singapore. That's a disturbing thought. How extensive is this class divide? I want more data on this issue. So I worked with Channel NewsAsia to commission one of the largest surveys on this divisive topic. We have here a whole lot of data representing two months of fieldwork, and some of the results are quite unsettling. Well, what we're seeing here is that if you compare between race, religion, sexual orientation, nationality, and class, class matters. Almost half of the respondents feel that income inequality is most likely to cause a social divide in Singapore. And it's a huge gap between this and the rest of the options. People think about this, you know, Security's low class job. They see your security earlier. Sometimes feel like a llama. This stuff, this, this show why people look like very downright for his work.

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When I work as an accountant, I was treated professionally. But when I do part-time jobs, things were very, very different. Being a banker with us, I was not even like treated properly as a human being.

Most researchers define class by income, housing type, and education. What about the rest of us? My name is Who's Easily. I'm 29 years old. I am a content creator online. Also, I'm a lab analyst. Also, just graduated from university. Adrian along. I was a money broker. My name is Ching Hai, and I'm fiscally. I'll be like identifying Singaporeans. Josh, the social class. Its Lomita in high. Right? We will expect certain behavior from the way we brought up over here. I set up a little social experiment. Oh, hi. Good to see you. To see how people decipher which social class a stranger belongs to. Nice shoes. Okay, idea. You prefer. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Middle class. I'm just gonna be safe. I never put anyone that's low. Whoa. Okay. Do you mind if I see you like whatever? Wow. Okay. You come from me. To hi, guarantee. If this is the Singapore Math, right? Are you on the coastal side, or are you in the middle of Singapore? Northwest. So you treat like fish. Nice boots. These are boots. How many minutes of commute does it take for you to get to work? For a visa, we shall car. Okay. Which you like going? You can go poking. Hello, because a Boeing is not ready expensive. Please. Where you go in your free time? This accident. Is it from your lifestyle of watching Americanized content, or is it from your traveling abroad? I lived in America for like five news. I'm gonna put this girl. Hi there. You go. Yeah. One, two, three, four, five. Out of how many people do we have? Seriously, a right. Oh, seven. Okay. Okay. You tell Milo in Congo? No. Why did they see? Don't they? They see I'll be live. I say no, right? If I'm being honest, my subconscious mind do immediately box people up. How are you behaving? And they were strictly this. Our human nature. That's true. We do classify you as you are with Mitch glass. But at the same time, I think I do that out of interest. Like, okay, that means this person and I, we can have the share interest. Well, did I get wrong? You. What are your hobbies? Where do you shop? What are your favorite brands? Where do you travel to? Questions our participants asked to determine a person's social class. Is that reflective of the rest of us?

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So this is website called Quora.com. How it works is that you input a question, and members of the public can contribute their replies. And I thought I would look up how I would determine my socio-economic class in Singapore. And it looks like someone has already asked the same question. There's a few replies. Some have suggested your income, or your property. And others have thought about your occupation, or your education. Or your state of mind. That somehow your confidence, your social etiquette, and how brand-obsessed you are can also contribute to your socio-economic status. Your perception of social class here in Singapore.

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We can make class markers out of anything. How someone speaks or dresses. And it may be wildly off the mark. Yet, we can't help labeling people. And often, along with the label comes the stereotype. The stereotypes between classes are so common that recently, a social science guidebook even codified them into text. This would cause such an uproar that it got pulled off the shelves. But I've managed to find a secondhand copy here. This book says that using Singlish, playing soccer at the HTTP void deck, and eating at Hocus enters are markers of a lower socioeconomic status. When this first went viral online, I was shocked too. But I can't help but wonder if it reflects what people are secretly thinking. In the SIENE survey, we asked what people really think of others from different social classes of society. They were given over 20 characteristics to choose from. Simply in terms of perception, Singaporeans have of the upper class. The top three are able to speak good English. Almost everyone check that box. Tend to plan ahead, and domineering. As for the perceptions of the lower class, most people thought they were friendly, caring, but tend to speak English. But what was more interesting were the differences between how people saw the upper classes versus the lower classes. Arrogant. That was the biggest gap. People also thought that someone from the upper classes was more likely to plan ahead and be luckier than someone from the lower class. The survey reveals that we think differently of people depending on their social class. But how did these inherent biases come about? I decide to bring together people from different ends of the class divide for a conversation. On my right, on my left, I'm going to be reading out some statements.

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I, I don't have meaningful friendships with people from the other side. Step forward if you agree. It's not that I'd want to make friends. I try to make friends, but they from the way I dress. I mean, like, well, I wear something like that. They'd be like, well, very low-class. They say this time. Yes, they do say this. You from where? What's your education? Ever so kind of like, why are you asking me that kind of question? It's not the way it's supposed to be. I could switch so that I can speak to the other side. We are the one, the middle class and the lower class people have to sometimes react or change ourselves in order to blend with them. So we have to act. It's always uncomfortable for you to be very uncomfortable because it's not you. You have to be somebody else in order to to be has it to be with. Yeah, yeah. The group itself. So when you are finally just yourself, do you feel excluded? Definitely. Definitely. I guess, I mean, you see other people. We might might feel that, oh, we have a stereotype in mind, and you know, something we so we might speak a certain way. But but that really doesn't mean that I think he's up a different class. That I think that, you know, she's lesser than me or he's more than me. I think the other side judges me for which side I'm on. Yeah. If people know, for example, that I grew up with a maid at home, I think they judge me as being incompetent. I don't know how to take care of anything at home myself. Yeah, I guess sometimes people think that, you know, you've got it easy. The thought that I don't have that means I, I don't have that power, the money power, the judge sure. Totally, really, really, you know, really condemn you. I would spend a day on the other side. Yeah, it's not like going somewhere dangerous or, oh, like our life. We do have obviously we go for the interest. And I just put those homeless people. Are you willing to go to the streets? Just all go to the beach? Just sleeping down there alone? You know, we've like no food. Maybe like you got inside your pocket, maybe like five bucks. So how are you gonna survive that? Have you been in such a situation before? I've been, yeah. So forth, please. But I made you survive. And here I am. For both sides, this is the first time they are having a conversation about the class divide with someone from outside their social class.

The wealth of our country is easy to see. You get clean streets, orderliness, skyscrapers, not a beggar in sight. The personal distribution of wealth may not be so visible until you look just a bit closer. Here on one side of the river, a luxurious condominiums and expensive restaurants. The most luxurious homes can go beyond two thousand US dollars per square foot. Just one bridge away is a vastly different seat.

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This is where the poorest people in Singapore live. One room rental flats that cost less than 20 US dollars a month. Geographically, the rich and the poor don't live very far apart at all. In fact, the government has plans to bring them even closer. These new blocks will be called integrated blocks, comprising rental and sold units in the same area to encourage social mixing. I'm here in neighborhood today. Jimmy Dr. Liang Channel, because he thinks it's not a good idea. When you bring them together, there will be tensions because the the needs, the parties, the values are different. So how do you ensure that bringing them together but able to mitigate or address some of the potential frictions on the grow? I think that would be the challenge. How do you deal with the potential complications of mixed housing? I think it's important to recognize that contact alone may not necessarily produce the desired outcome. Or is important to ensure that the conditions of the contact is acceptable to everybody. What do you mean by conditions of contact? So, in other words, you have to ensure that nobody feels intimidated, nobody feels that we're being slighted, you know, because they are engaging with someone of a different level or different status. Classism, that means a prejudice against someone who is from a different social class. Shared spaces won't work if classism prevails.

So what I want to know is, when we start becoming class conscious, my producers asked me to come here today. They say they have something to show me. Hello, what's happening? We have interviewed 9 to 11 year-olds. And I want you to watch this. Okay. They like the, those stationary that have. They just admire my stuff and they take it. Asking for it. How much? Jeremy, or their friends just don't care how much money they give their kids. Because it makes me sad. I am selfish. And I like this money. If you have the most expensive things, you're the most popular. So sneaker, pencil case, Mingo, bet. What? There was no cost. They're quite expensive. They're just very nice-looking. You can show them off. When I was a kid, playground politics was about who was faster, stronger, or better at football. But now it's more about pocket money and pencil boxes and other things that reflect how rich or poor you are. I think makes people more people. How come you're rich? So they don't really know what it's like to be poor. These business about how the Pokemons take a [ __ ] they don't create them, but they don't see any things. Just like, yeah, I've been said. These were people say nice things like, go get a job and soften them. My father has become have to be a dentist or doctor, cuz he says we've been a mannequin jet boat and about who goes. My father Eugene tells me that I have to like what harder in my exams, in my studies, or ask our our becoming one who is like those like garbage truck, those are the curvature in those Tina's on streets. If we don't side yet, we don't have money and beer it as I know back then. What do you think of the poor people? Are they, they may be good socially, but maybe they don't have the skills to cope a job? The interesting thing is that all the kids, regardless of whether they were rich or poor, felt that the key to success was hard work. While the children believe in this, I want to know if the rest of us really do. My daughter, guess she said to me, she carries a lot of pocket money. Even some of the girls, they look because she's rich, she doesn't want to mix wrong with her. She will be affected. So she will come back and enough to search.

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When they see that I drive a BMW, actually meet comments like, wow, you're so young and you are already driving a BMW. You are very successful. You know, sometimes it's a false run. It makes me feel a little bit empty and desert of all this.

I've served in the education ministry for two years. And in those years, I visited all kinds of schools. I've conducted dialogues with hundreds of students, teachers, and principals. But this time, I'm doing things slightly differently. I've invited students aged 15 to 17 from different schools and different educational tracks to come together for an honest face-to-face. How would you describe the expectations that the parents have of you? I am the humanities. So for a period of time, my mom was quite adamant about me pursuing law. They expect me doing just like us. Very high weight. So at least and all my subject, it to be more. They don't really have much expectations on me, right? They were just go to the floor. What are the expectations you place upon yourself? At uni, I want to study um, either political science or maybe law. And after that, I want to pursue maybe a career in the Foreign Affairs. May be studying IT and get a certificate in getting me job. I hope that I can at least get into NUS. But if I find myself having the opportunity to go overseas, I would definitely take that. My petition is just to pass on my subject because I've been feeling since everyone for the things that I'm good at, minimally is for all of them and a tool. But an e-2 would be considered disappointing, I guess, because I expect myself to get at least anyone. It's probably obvious by this point which educational track each child is in. Beyond the expectations, I want to know how much they interact with students from a different stream. Hang out with people there from excess in my school because most of the people in my experience and they looked down on us and the thing that we are quite stupid. So the so so them talk to us as well. The kind of activities that like my school may expose to me outside of school generally tend to be quite populated by the hire extra streams, are like IP streams, rather than like lower streams like any and team. But so, for example, for me to make friends with people from any and and T or like normal, like neighborhood schools requires a lot more effort from me. How about yourself? Because for my school, like the space right, tend to see themself like very good directory stated in the school. So the tenuous years, like we are nothing. Today, the behavior did you just ignore us? Is it just because they are an expression your aunty or something else? Or even allows us, we don't beef this image them like, yeah, very quite a need in school, not as like we usually create chaos. Yeah, that is good. You should just say like, you are from Norma ketamine, you are stupid. She said that. I mean, I just inputs that one. And so we I start to become very quiet in squares, right? I don't really like to talk. Do you try to make friends? What do you think it's not what they don't know interest or what? Some some misplaced. Yeah, I try easily topic me like interact from a bit. But an sometimes I, you know, because you really spit and really defend their English. Like what kind of behavior do they show that makes you angry? Rule the ice us sometimes. Sure. If we just put all of you all in the same class, do you think that would look helped? I don't if they are willing to teach. I have us. Yeah, you know, I wish Lou. Yeah, I didn't I get it. You won't teach me. Or mixed class suggestion may not be very viable. And comes off like closing the gap. It might even increase the gap if these students feel like they can't cope. So they just give up completely. Is this conversation uncomfortable? Either because really classing? Yeah, I was feeling awkward and embarrassed. And maybe maybe I had engineered a situation to highlight the differences between the kids. I'm feeling a bit bad about that. But I think the reality is that's what they face every day. We want to remove ourselves from situations where we feel embarrassed or awkward. And maybe that's one of the reasons why it's so difficult for kids of different backgrounds to interact regularly all the time and develop deep friendships.

Every Chinese New Year, my mother will make me hide all my school books and homework under the bed because she's doing our relatives to see the work. Normal on the book covers, unless you sum all of them say that I'm from Express. This is an excerpt from a play called Normal. It tells the story of two normal academic stream students. You see that you're Ashley and Daphne had to battle negative stereotypes. The play caused quite a buzz when debuted in 2015. I didn't manage to catch it then, so I thought I would meet the playwright, Faith Own, to find out what she had gone through that inspired the sold-out play. She was herself from the normal stream. How did your family's circumstances affect what was happening to you? I think the clearest memory I have is my parents having conversations about finances and things being quite heated. And these conversations were continued until 5 a.m. in the morning, and I wouldn't sleep at all. We will be late for school, and then we were getting trouble with the prefect and the discipline mistrust. And then we wouldn't have the energy to focus in class. And also emotionally, our head would be somewhere else, worrying about our parents, worrying about the family. I guess to the teachers, people look like we were daydreaming or just not paying attention in class. Yeah, and will you frankly, I was not paying attention in class. You weren't very motivated. I wasn't. I had a very poor self-esteem. Why? The things that the teachers were saying, I guess, as far as the things that we were telling each other, just because we came from normal. So he just would say things like, even though we are from normal, and that even though already, what would imply a lot. So you can't deduce that it means you're not as good as everybody else. How long did it take you to then get out of this situation? This low self-esteem? It took a really long time. And every stage, I had this very strong imposter syndrome. Like I didn't actually quite belong. And whatever success I had, I was lucky. Faith studied hard and did well enough to enter junior college. While it took her more than a decade to get over the stigma, she went on to get a master's degree. She's now a part-time university lecturer. It's been one sobering story after another. But Faith's story gives me some hope because her story isn't just one of class bias. It's also one of social mobility. And that's what we try very hard to give to all Singaporeans. The opportunity to rise above their circumstances. I've always believed in this country. It's your ability, not your connections, that's important. But clearly, not everyone feels the same way. Channel NewsAsia did a survey on the extent of the country's class divide. When asked what it would take to get rich, people from the lower class suggested that knowing the right people was the third most important reason. Above this was education. And most importantly, hard work. In contrast, when people from the upper class were asked how to get rich, they suggested that hard work was the third most important reason. Above this was ability. And the most important reason of all was knowing the right people. Education didn't factor into their top three reasons at all. When it comes to social mobility, only half of people from the lower class are confident that their next generation's financial situation will improve.

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Why do people feel this way? Is education still creating a level playing field? Samuel Chun teaches at Anglican High, a school many would deem as a branded school. Very good. Okay. Anyone else wants to add to this list of traits? But he also volunteers at a nonprofit organization called Readable, where he teaches low-income students for free. As a perception that the kids in the top secondary schools all come from certain primary schools. Do you think that's true? Well, the education system, we don't stream for affluence. We don't say, oh, you know, our criteria is you have to be above us or an income bracket to get into a school. What we do is dream for is academic ability. What I think we see is that there are some primary schools where kids perhaps have higher scores for a variety of reasons. Why is it that certain primary schools just consistently do well? Then I guess there's a combination of factors going on. Because of public perceptions, you know, a certain school is a better school. Certain parents aggregate towards that school. I think family has a big part to play on because of the parents' background. They give me our children the familial, the cultural, the financial resources to really give them a head start. So I do think that we're seeing a gap in achievement for different students. So there's a perception about the effectiveness of education as a social level today compared to the past. What do you say to that? This question is, I'm addressing something very real, which is the felt sense that society is more unequal. But if anything, I think education is kind of a symptom of that rather than a cause. There's this perception that athlete children have more of a head start. But in terms of where their education can still function as a social worker? Yeah, I think so. I think very much so. There's a stigma associated with streaming. Do you think that's right? The rationale for streaming wasn't we're gonna choose the best and train only the best. The rationale was every single student has different learning needs. And from one perspective, streaming has been hugely successful because if you look at dropout rates now, the rate, the number of people who complete 10 years of general education, I think it's something like 99%. That's huge. Education is working as a social level. But I am disturbed that it's also seen as a class label. Will we ever be able to overcome this bias? Study not so high before easily. Well, you don't. I feel really upset and set up.

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So this arsenic will chain company. Oh, teens analogy. Suzumiya to phenomena to the Jetta yo TN something young. Harmon can be worn.

There are 60,000 rental flat units in Singapore. The families living here earn less than $1,500 a month. Life is often a struggle. In Singapore, the government has significantly increased financial aid to the needy, and yet there remains a segment of the population trapped in poverty. As a politician, I often grapple with this question. What would it take to lift these families up? If more handouts is not the answer, then what is? Hello. Hey, Sofia. How are you? Maybe city. Sofia, who spent the last 15 years living in this rental unit, can tell me. Married twice, this divorcee now raises four children on her own. I want to ask her all the things about poverty that most people don't dare to. Sofia, how did you end up in this financial situation? My second child was diagnosed with HIV. Station of asthma. So my money, my financial, wow, it's totally very difficult for me to cope. So at that point, I couldn't work because, I mean, which employ I wanted to employ somebody who always technique because my son will be admitted like in a week, three days, he he will be in hospital. When you go and renew your financial assistance, how difficult is that? They will ask me, what is your plan, ma'am? Are you planning to go out to work? If I want to go out to work, I need somebody to tend to my children. Where'd you get the money for things like phones and TVs? Okay, like the phones, my children can you hurry? Why are money they keep, they accumulate, then they buy TV. TV, this TV was donated from Salvation Army. So I bought it about $30. Quite go back in for the people in, you know. What about your expectations for your kids? What's happening in their education? I actually expect the my children to be like me in all my kidding me level, you see. But my children was in normal technical. Both my other boys. Yeah, that part, I do feel a bit sella. That's hitch. Ah, you say you would know your spending, know already. Sofia has been receiving financial assistance for years, but she's still stuck in a rental flat. That's not how it's meant to work.

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I decide to pay a visit to Cindy. She's head of a family service center and how come a social worker for decades. I'm hoping she can tell me what needs to be done for people like Sophia.

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So why is it that there are families that after years of intervention are still stuck in the social situation? Accessing resources just one. And because it happens at birth and within sharing becomes worse, the gap becomes wider. The other factors would be really complicated sociological factors such as intergenerational abuse and poverty. Because poverty has a way of creating chronic stress in the body system. With years and years of chronic stress, it is an unhealed. How sometimes to help them needs to stabilize and the Bible that she utilized some of the resources that are available. So you're suggesting that access to resources is one, and then the ability to use the resources, another factor? That's right. What do you think needs to be done to bridge the gap? For the education and early support for children who are in low-income families, and not tie the excess of resources for children to their parents' marital status, or socioeconomic status, or even in what state. What about the balance between the parental responsibilities and social responsibility? Isn't isn't that less important? I think we want to look at the owner ability of the children. Because if they are dependent on their parents, then if we want them to get a good start in life, then it will be quite unfair for the children's outcome, life outcomes to be dependent on whether dependents of 90 days of a man is right. Now, most people either swing the swing both ways. I want to say anything that, you know, the poor are poor because they are lazy, unmotivated, you just can't make good decisions on you string all together. So I think, you know, it's all structural. You know, the poor has no responsibility. Either side really paints a very poor picture of how probably. So what is the right picture? Which is somewhere in between. There, we recognize structural factors that maintains poverty, then we also understand it, the point of cost have the potential to inspire and x-file to us towards better life. I'm not convinced that long-term government handouts is the solution. I went in search of those trying to make a ground-up difference, and it led me to a cup of coffee. Only 21, Evelyn makes a delicious and beautiful cup of coffee. I can hardly tell she's only been at the job for a month. How long did it take you to master this? One to two weeks. Just one to two weeks. So it was your first attempt as bad as mine? No. [Laughter] Once upon a time, people thought Evelyn was good for nothing. After all, she dropped out of school at secondary three, ran away from home, and got into trouble with the law. What is it that turned everything around? Me? I went for emotional training. She taught me how to overcome my anger, be more confident, be more happy. The only other people fight you. So ten years from now, what do you see in your future? Maybe become a lady boss. Yeah. Are people surprised when you tell them this kind of dream and ambitions? Probably. I told my mom, and she was like, shocked. What? Because in the past, I'm not that good. Actually, I have no confidence in myself.

Pamela Cheung has helped scores of women like Evelyn. She made a mid-career switch seven years ago to start Better Forrester, her vision to provide marginalized women with an employable skill. What's your vision for the business going forward? I think for us, it's creating a culture and a mindset of trying to be able to help people to move up along the value chain in a kind, empathetic way, but yet not compromising on standards in quality. To me, there are two main segments, right? That's the home and family environment, and then it's the work environment. So there is little we can do about the home environment, right? But in the work environment, I think businesses can do a lot to say, rethink how we're working. Are you worried that this is very small-scale? You're only impacting a small number of people through your approach? I think the approach that we're taking here is really looking at the depth of the impacts and the longevity of the impacts. So if we can change one person's life, and they go around and change their children's lives, their family's lives, and then their community's lives, then you can start to amplify the impact in the way. So what you're doing is commendable, but what's the incentive for everyone else to get on board? Not easy to do. No, absolutely not. I think they said it is the future. What future do you want to create for yourself? It's only human to seek out people who are like us, to find our tribe. But I worry that our survey reveals divisions in our society. People from the higher classes are much more likely to participate in society, for example, by volunteering in labor unions, sports clubs, into professional associations, and non-governmental organizations, or engaging in arts and cultural activities, as compared to people from the lower classes. And it probably explains the next set of results. 70% of the higher classes feel a strong sense of belonging, as compared to 46% of the lower classes. And 76% of the higher classes feel proud to be Singaporean, as compared to 50% of the lower classes. And this is the gap that really matters to me. The rich feel connected to Singapore, and the poor do not.

June 2018, we celebrated Singapore's National Day here. Just two months back, on that day, while everyone appeared to be bursting with pride, in reality, your class affects how you feel about the country. In 1965, we were worried that race, language, or religion would be our greatest fault lines. In 2018, it's class. And I realized this class gap is really an inclusion gap. Tackling this divide is central to what makes a Singaporean, that no one should consider themselves a second-class citizen.

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