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SINGAPORE: Singapore cannot depend on just low corporate tax or cost alone to compete in the years ahead.
In response to questions from MPs on the Budget debate, Second Finance Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said Singapore must also compete in terms of skills and even quality of life to stay competitive.
Mr Tharman said there are other factors that would put Singapore at the cutting edge, such as the skills level of a productive workforce and a seamless infrastructure.
In essence, it is what Singapore can offer investors in a total comprehensive package.
But even then the rules keep changing as competitors try and overtake Singapore.
The finance minister said: "Our approach keeps competitive headline rates and incentives for the leading edge players and has low rates for start-ups and SMEs. That's the way we keep creating clusters of high value-added activities in Singapore that can generate opportunities for our local firms and create good jobs for our workers."
Mr Tharman also noted that since the Budget was revealed some two weeks ago, numerous foreign companies have picked Singapore to do business in.
For example, Internet payment company PayPal has located its regional HQ here, and Internet search engine Google has also decided to do R&D here – a first in Southeast Asia.
As MPs have also discovered, it is the quality of life in Singapore that will attract and keep people here.
Mr Tharman said Singapore is doing well, having been ranked the second-best city in the world, after Italy, for dining and night-life.
He said: "The competition we face is increasingly with other key cities, not just primary cities but emerging secondary cities. And this is why we have to keep remaking and reinventing ourselves as a city. It is not just to appear on magazine covers.
"It is a key competitive factor. It attracts people, it retains people. And it provides an appealing and inspiring home for every Singaporean. That's why we have to invest to transform our living and business environment, public housing, the new marina bay, a new network of green and blue."
Mr Tharman agreed with MPs that more could be done to encourage and let the creative art scene flourish as well as cultivate first-class social habits in an environmentally conscious city.
- CNA/so
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