Motion: Kenneth Tiong on an economy of the future that works for all

Create a special zone around Nanyang Technological University, built around the needs of young people and young companies. Spanning co-living, enterprise and R&D, it would be “zoned for organic messiness”. This state land would be charged at cost recovery rather than market value and take its returns from companies that grow there. Making the proposal, Workers’ Party (WP) MP Kenneth Tiong described it as a controlled experiment in whether Singapore’s land pricing regime is suppressing entrepreneurship and indigenous capital formation. In parliament on Wednesday (Aug 5), he moved a motion on WP’s vision for Singapore’s economy and its response to the government’s economic plans. He said Singapore needs to build an economy where fair distribution is built into growth, instead of growing first and redistributing later. So, it needs an economic engine driven by dynamic local companies, healthy domestic demand and Singaporeans and Singapore capital venturing abroad.