Singapore has developed a unique housing system, with three-quarters of its housing stock built by the Housing & Development Board (HDB) and homeownership financed through Central Provident Fund (CPF) savings. As a result, the country's homeownership rate of 90% is one of the highest among market economies. At different stages of its economic development, the Government of Singapore was faced with a different set of housing problems. An integrated land–housing supply and financing framework was established in the 1960s to solve the severe housing shortage. By the 1990s, the challenge was that of renewing aging estates and creating a market for HDB transactions. Housing subsidies in the form of housing grants were also introduced. Recent challenges include curbing speculative and investment demand, as well as coping with increasing income inequalities and an aging population. These have brought about carefully crafted macroprudential policies, targeted housing grants, and schemes to help elderly households monetize their housing equity. This paper analyzes key pillars of the housing policy, specifically land acquisition, the HDB-CPF system, the role of markets, housing market interventions, the Ethnic Integration Policy, and the Lease Buyback Scheme. It concludes with lessons learned for other countries.
"This book tells how public authorities in Singapore designed and adapted policies for allocating land, capital, and labor in order to create good places for Singapore citizens and residents to live and work, setting the infrastructure for people in Singapore to create a poster-child East Asia economic miracle of the late 20th century ... The book is among other things a fascinating analytical economic history about how Singapore purposefully deployed a suite of interrelated public policies about land use, life cycle savings, taxation, regulation, and ethnic toleration."--THOMAS J. SARGENT, Nobel Laureate in Economics "Rich in facts, data, and scholarly analyses, this book tells a fascinating story of Singapore's affordable housing policy. It eloquently demonstrates that the objective of affordable housing is achievable. Global cities around the world struggling from declining housing affordability could learn a lot from Singapore's success."--ZHI LIU, Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, USA "Which country gets the housing market right? This is a question that experts very often get at conferences, gatherings, and during interviews. And usually "Singapore" comes up as one of the answers. Sock-Yong Phang does an excellent job in sharing her knowledge on Singapore's housing market, and on what has and has not worked."--HITES AHIR, International Monetary Fund Global cities today are facing fundamental challenges in relation to unaffordable housing and growing economic inequality. Singapore's success in making homeownership possible for 90% of its population has attracted much attention internationally. This book represents a culmination of research by the author on key housing policy innovations for affordable housing. Housing policy changes were effected in the 1960s through reforms of colonial legislation and institutions dealing with state land acquisition, public housing, and provident fund savings. The comprehensive housing framework that was established enabled the massive resettlement of households from shophouses, slums and villages to high-rise government-built flats. In the 1980s and 1990s, housing market and land use regulations were amended in response to the changing needs of a growing economy. Housing policies have also been utilised to curb housing speculation, build racially inclusive communities, and reduce wealth inequality. More recently, an ageing population of homeowners has necessitated focus on policies for housing equity extraction. This landmark title is of relevance to all developing economies exploring alternative systems of affordable housing. Sock-Yong Phang is Celia Moh Chair Professor of Economics at the Singapore Management University, Singapore. She is the author of Housing Finance Systems: Market Failures and Government Failures (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), as well as numerous publications on housing, urban transportation and public-private partnerships in scholarly journals
Global cities today are facing fundamental challenges in relation to unaffordable housing and growing economic inequality. Singapore's success in making home ownership possible for 90% of its population has attracted much attention internationally. This book represents a culmination of research by the author on key housing policy innovations for affordable housing. Housing policy changes were effected in the 1960s through reforms of colonial legislation and institutions dealing with state land acquisition, public housing, and provident fund savings. The comprehensive housing framework that was established enabled the massive resettlement of households from shophouses, slums and villages to high-rise government-built flats. In the 1980s and 1990s, housing market and land use regulations were amended in response to the changing needs of a growing economy.
The author explains how the government of Singapore has taken on the role of land use planner and housing developer to ensure affordable housing. Numerous instruments have been devised by governments to provide affordable housing. These can be classified into four broad categories: taxes and subsidies, land use and market regulations, public-private partnerships, and institutions that supply housing or provide financing.
Singapore has developed its own unique state-driven housing system, with more than three quarters of its housing stock built by the Housing and Development Board and homeownership financed through Central Provident Fund savings. As a result, it has one of the highest homeownership rates amongst market economies. This paper provides a historical perspective of the main housing problems faced by successive prime ministers and their respective policy responses. Under the leadership of Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew (1959-1990), the government established an integrated landhousing supply and housing finance framework to channel much needed resources into the housing sector to deal with a chronic housing shortage. Under Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong (1990-2004), asset enhancement schemes to renew aging estates as well as market deregulation measures were implemented. Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong (2004-present) has been confronted with a different set of challenges - investment demand for housing, rising inequalities and rapidly aging population. These problems have brought about the introduction of carefully crafted macroprudential policies, targeted housing grants to assist low and middle income households, and schemes to help elderly households monetize their housing equity.
Asia's rapid urbanization and growing incomes have resulted in a corresponding booming market in motor vehicle sales. In 2013, an estimated 18 million new passenger cars were sold in China. Motor vehicle users generate congestion, pollution, accidents, noise and road damage. Yet, in most cities motor vehicle users often do not pay the full social costs and are therefore implicitly subsidized by non-users. According to the Tom Tom Traffic Index, which is based on GPS data, motorists in the worst congested cities in developed countries spend up to 40% more time for peak hour commutes. This level of delay is relatively benign when compared to the congestion problems in many developing country cities where traffic jams of the 'monster' variety have on occasion stretched on for over 100 km and lasted for several days. Congestion and pollution are examples of instances of market failure which justify government intervention. That these problems persist and have grown in magnitude reflect government failure to adequately implement policies to address these issues.
According to a 2011 IMF study, Singapore's level of government intervention in housing finance is the highest in the developed world (Slide 3). This level of intervention in housing finance has correspondingly produced the highest level of homeownership amongst advanced countries. This housing outcome is the result of our very unique HDB-CPF housing framework – an institutional framework that was established in the 1960s during the formative period of our country?s history (Slides 4 and 5). Singapore was, at that particular point in time, faced with a situation of chronic housing shortage, low homeownership rates and an underdeveloped housing mortgage sector due to the high risks involved in lending for low income housing (Slide 6).
The topic of HDB housing is one that is close to the hearts and minds of the majority of Singaporeans. The first part of the presentation will provide a brief overview of price trends in Singapore's housing sector. The second part delves into the market and policy factors behind the rapid increase in HDB housing prices since 2006. The monograph "Reflections on Housing a Nation" published by the Ministry of National Development in February 2011, contains numerous statements on the goals of housing policy. Briefly, the government is committed to affordable home ownership as a major pillar of Singapore's public housing policy. It tracks the Housing-Price-to-Income Ratio as well as the Debt Service Ratio for new HDB flats closely as housing affordability indicators. In addition to housing affordability objectives, HDB flats are also assets which the HDB commits "to upgrade (from time to time, budget permitting)" and "whose value can be unlocked, if needed." It is not surprising therefore that market fundamentals, coupled with credible government commitment to both housing affordability and asset appreciation, have caused housing to be perceived as an attractive asset to buy and hold.The third part of the presentation will discuss the challenges posed by the government's set of policy commitments to public housing. Amongst these has been the need to discourage speculation and investment in housing. In this regard, during the period from September 2009 to December 2011, there were in all 4 rounds of measures to dampen the housing market.
In market economies, the government acts in many ways. In traditional public finance literature, the government taxes and provides public and merit goods. In addition, it regulates the behaviour of firms and individuals. In the context of market failures such as natural monopoly, high risk situations or long life projects, the government may choose to act as producer. In the past two decades, however, public sector collaboration with the private sector to achieve socio-economic objectives has become widely utilised as a method for the provision of the myriad of services that has come to be expected of governments.
Affordable homeownership is a policy that is often accorded a great deal of policy attention by governments of many countries. This paper aims to examine the market implications of setting a housing price to income ratio target for a market segment by the government. The policy requires active intervention by the government with regard to the targeted sector. The paper uses a simple model of the housing market with a homeownership affordability target to derive the market implications of such targets. In the presence of uncertainty and resource constraints, the objective of homeownership affordability is achieved for the targeted group at the expense of greater volatility in residential construction activity. When the size of the targeted sector is significant in size, there are spillover price and crowding out effects on the non-targeted housing market segment. This results in political pressure on the government to expand homeownership affordability targets to increasing segments of the population. Housing price to income ratios tend to be fairly constant over time and across targeted groups, the housing supply is relatively price inelastic and the income elasticity of housing demand is less than one. The Singapore government intervenes extensively in the housing sector to ensure homeownership affordability, with a resulting homeownership rate of 91 percent for the resident population. The above hypotheses regarding the implications of setting housing price to income ratio targets are tested using the Singapore housing market.
This article charts the evolving regulation of cooperation and coordination between international transport firms, in particular those operating within the liner shipping and international air transport sectors. There has been a long history of exemption of these sectors from the rules and regulations of antitrust or competition law. In the past three decades, regulatory reforms and privatization have, however, subjected these sectors to competitive forces that have transformed these industries. With the introduction of competition law in many jurisdictions, the justifications for their continued exemption have come under intense scrutiny. In the late 19705, the US initiated deregulation of its domestic airline sector and introduced reforms in the regulation of liner shipping which resulted in greater competition and lower prices. In 2006, the EU adopted a tougher stance by becoming the first jurisdiction to remove exemption for IATA passenger tariff conferences from 2007 and for liner shipping conferences from 2008. While arguments for the benefits of competition can be generally made, the lack of harmonization of competition laws together with the international nature of these sectors (which are further complicated by high concentration, network characteristics, and government sanctioned barriers to entry) continue to present challenges for competition authorities.
Affordable homeownership is a policy that is often accorded a great deal of policy attention by governments of many countries. In this paper, we examine the market implications of setting a housing price to income ratio target for a market segment by the government. The policy requires active intervention by the government with regard to the targeted sector. We use a simple model of the housing market with a homeownership affordability target to derive the market implications of such targets. In the presence of uncertainty and resource constraints, the objective of homeownership affordability is achieved for the targeted group at the expense of greater volatility in residential construction activity. When the size of the targeted sector is significant in size, there are spillover price and crowding out effects on the non-targeted housing market segment. This results in political pressure on the government to expand homeownership affordability targets to increasing segments of the population. Housing price to income ratios tend to be fairly constant over time and across targeted groups, the housing supply is relatively price inelastic and the income elasticity of housing demand is less than one. The Singapore government intervenes extensively in the housing sector to ensure homeownership affordability, with a resulting homeownership rate of 91 percent for the resident population. The above hypotheses regarding the implications of setting housing price to income ratio targets are tested using the Singapore housing market. The experience and data for Singapore were found to support the above hypotheses.
