Baby Boom Essay

Singapore experiences its first post-war baby boom in 1946 with a 58 percent increase in live births from 1945 to 1946 and this period extended over almost two decades. According to the census data in 2000, the number of persons born during this period accounts for almost 34% of the total resident population in Singapore. The elder baby boom generation (born from 1946 to 1954) had already reached their 60s at present and by the end of 2030, the younger baby boom generation will also reach into their 60s. With the ageing baby boom generation, Singapore is about to grey rapidly over the following decades. While the baby boom lasted for 20 years, the echo was quickly curtailed.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, several changes were made by the government to delay the expanding population due to its soaring vision for rapid industrialization and socioeconomic planning. Families were encouraged to “Stop at two” through incentives and disincentives. This included unpaid

They could choose to pursue formal education and skills training, and enter the workforce to gain economic dependence. However, such changes in the employment landscape have been perceived differently across sexes particularly between married working men and women in the Asian context. Most studies found that working women are faced with a higher amount of domestic workload than men. Additionally, because education increases one’s career prospects, it is expected that men have a career, rather than just secure a job in labour. As a result, women are still perceived to spend their role as a primary caregiver, fulfilling domestic obligations for the family and their elderly parents on top of their role as a provider. With such expectations, married women are more prone to suffer the effect of double burden role. Inevitably this would transform the meaning of marriage in single women’s lives and tend to delay