The 2018 Limpeh Singapore social class survey
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Title : The 2018 Limpeh Singapore social class survey
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Title : The 2018 Limpeh Singapore social class survey
link : The 2018 Limpeh Singapore social class survey
news-today.world | Hi guys, time for a more fun post - I've been ill, I've been talking about depressing stuff, let's write something fun to read for a change. Okay so my friend has shared this post on social media about this study which found a "evidence of a social class divide in Singapore". To which I just totally rolled my eyes and thought, are you guys for real? Because for me, it is so evident that this social class divide has been there for decades - Singapore has never ever been some kind of socialist utopia like Cuba or China where social classes were eradicated. Hell no, just open our history books and see the way Singapore has thrived on the very essence of capitalism since the early days as a trading port soon after the British arrived in 1819. Capitalism means that you will create distinct groups of the 'haves' and 'have-nots' in society, social inequality has always been a major issue in Singapore. Vincent Chua, one of the NUS researchers of this project claims that we used to be a society that has been divided along the lines of religion or race instead of class: yeah right. That's based on the presumption that you can treat a group like Chinese-Singaporeans or Muslim-Singaporeans as a cohesive, monolithic entity at least in the past, when really even within such a group, it is really class that divides them into different sub-groups.
One thing I want to explain today is that class isn't the same thing has having money - although the link between wealth and class is complex. The classic example I would use is the ugly PRC-Chinese tourist (ie. from mainland China, as opposed to from say Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan or HK) who clearly has a lot of money but doesn't have the basic social graces and ends up doing something embarrassing like urinating in a very public place. That is perhaps a rather extreme example, but sometimes an extreme example is useful to illustrate points like that. So you see, social class is more than about what your bank balance is, whether you are rich or poor, but which segment of society you belong to. This is not something you can define for yourself: I can claim to be as fine as royalty if that's how I wish to define myself, but that definition is simply not a reasonable nor valid one since I clearly do not have much in common with the royal family. The BBC did a very interesting study about this topic back in 2013 with the BBC Great Class Calculator where it asked respondents a series of questions which would then decide which of seven social classes you belonged to. I didn't quite like that calculator for two reasons: I thought they didn't go into enough detail with the questions and that there just too few classes - surely you can't reduce the complexity of our society into just seven classes today?
Having wealth is a start, but what you do with that wealth is what defines your social class - allow me to explain. In the UK where we have been obsessed with defining people by their social class for centuries, we would ask innocent sounding questions to try to identify patterns in your life to determine what social class you belong to. What do you do for leisure? What kind of education did you have? Do you have access to expensive luxurious activities like golf or skiing? Do you spend your money accessing high culture or mass entertainment - say you have £2000 to spend on a weekend, do you go to get best seats for the opera or go watch a football match? Your choice of going high or low brow would probably be determined by what your peers would think of your choice - so you see, it goes way beyond doing stuff that makes you happy with your money, it has got a lot more to do with whom you're trying to identify with. Let's not even pretend that everyone is equal, but I don't think equality is the issue here: we're all extremely different, unique individuals and we naturally seek to form meaningful relationships with people whom we identify with. Now this could be pretty much determined by your parents and upbringing, or it could turn out to be the complete opposite (as in my case) - a hurrah for social mobility. We're all different - that much we can agree on - but let's look at how we are different.
Thus on that basis, I am going to offer Limpeh's Singapore 2018 class survey which is pretty much based on the 2013 BBC Great Class Calculator. The problem with the NUS survey is that it only makes comparisons within Singapore - such as comparing those who went to elite schools to those who haven't. In 2018, you need to look at this on a more global scale: you can't put someone who went to Harvard in the same category as someone who went to NUS - they clearly belong in two different categories even if they did go to the same secondary school. And of course we're far more likely to have friends from the same social class, then say someone of the same ethnicity, religion or nationality. This is all meant to offend most Singaporeans who think they are very atas when really, they are at best struggling middle class or just plain plebs. So if you have a thick skin and are ready to be insulted, here are my 20 questions for you:
Your financial situation
What is your personal income in the last financial year?
A) Under $20,000
B) Between $20,000 to $40,000
C) Between $40,000 to $80,000
D) Between $80,000 to $150,000
E) over $150,000
Do you own or rent property?
A) I live with my parents
B) I rent my current premises.
C) I have a mortgage for my first flat.
D) I have a buy to let on top of my current dwelling.
E) I have several properties.
Have you any savings (excluding CPF as you can't easily access it if you want to)?
A) None
B) up to $10k
C) up to $50k
D) up to $200k
E) over $200k
Pick the statement that best describes your current situation with your relationship with your bank.
A) I am in a lot of debt - my card keeps getting rejected.
B) I am just use the ordinary banking services like most people.
C) I have a mortgage with my bank.
D) I have access to premium banking services as a HNWI (high net worth individual).
E) I have my own private banker.
Your education
Where did you get your degree from?
A) My degree is not worth the paper it is printed on because I went to a private university like SIM.
B) I don't have a degree. That's right, you're better off not having a degree than having one from SIM.
C) NUS/NTU/SIM
D) A foreign university the equivalent of top 10 in UK/US.
E) Cambridge/Oxford/Ivy League/or equivalent in a country like Japan, Korea, France or Germany.
Have you had the chance to study abroad?
A) No, never.
B) I have at least had a teacher from another country.
C) I have spent at least a term abroad on exchange.
D) I did my degree abroad.
E) Not only did I do my degree abroad, I was educated in more than three countries, in more than three languages.
Did you ever study a foreign language during or before the completion of your degree? (And no, your L2 such as Malay, Tamil or Chinese does not count).
A) No, never.
B) I took some lessons.
C) I have the equivalent of A levels in a foreign language.
D) I am totally fluent in a foreign language.
E) Not only am I fluent in at least two foreign languages, I did part of my degree in a foreign language.
Did you ever learn a musical instrument during or before the age of 18?
A) No, never.
B) I took some lessons, but never any exams.
C) I completed a few exams.
D) I completed all the exams for a minimum of 8 years.
E) I did all the exams for more than one instrument.
Seeing the world
How many countries have you visited?
A) Under 10
B) 11 - 25
C) 25 - 45
D) 45 - 60
E) More than 60
How often do you travel?
A) Hardly ever
B) Once a year on average
C) A few times a year
D) About ten times a year
E) Every month, sometimes twice a month
What do you buy when you are abroad?
A) Point me to the nearest designer discount factory outlet
B) I just go to the usual souvenir shops
C) Usually food or drink that I enjoy
D) I spend money on memorable experiences like skydiving or going on a hot air balloon ride, but I don't need more possessions to clutter up my life.
E) I make a contribution a local charity that has inspired me.
How do you decide where you stay when on holiday?
A) Value for money - I want bargains
B) I want it to be convenient for transport, so near a bus or train station.
C) I want it to be near the major sites I wish to see.
D) It needs to be luxury, it is a holiday after all.
E) It needs to be too expensive for the plebs to afford, I don't want their company.
Your friends and social experiences
Which statement best describes your social circle:
A) I have very few or no friends.
B) Manual workers with blue collar jobs
C) A mix of blue and white collar workers, but mostly blue
D) A mix of blue and white collar workers, but mostly white
E) Exclusively white collar workers
Have you ever been invited to a reception at an embassy?
A) Yes, as a cleaner, I clean all venues including some embassies.
B) No, that will never happen.
C) I have been to a party hosted by a foreigner, but it wasn't at the embassy but some fancy restaurant, does that count?
D) Yes I have been once or twice, for work.
E) Yes, regularly, I get bored with those events.
Have you ever been skiing?
A) The closest I will get to seeing snow is having an ice-kachang.
B) I have once spent an hour at Snow City Jurong, does that count?
C) I have been once several years ago.
D) I have been a few times.
E) I ski several times a year.
Have you ever been sailing on a private yacht?
A) I have taken the ferry to Batam does that count?
B) I've been on the yacht, but it has never left the harbour.
C) I have been invited to do so a few times.
D) I do so regularly.
E) I have my own private yacht.
Have you ever flown first class?
A) I have never been on a plane.
B) No, never - only economy, I buy the cheapest tickets.
C) I have flown business class.
D) I do so regularly.
E) Yes but I prefer my private jet.
How would you describe the nationalities of your friends?
A) They are all locals.
B) They are mostly locals with a few foreigners.
C) They are a good mix of people from around the world plus locals.
D) They are mostly foreigners with a few locals.
E) They are all social elites, when you're an elite your nationality is inconsequential.
Pick the statement that best describes your attitude towards fashion.
A) Comfort is most important to me.
B) I like to get value for money when shopping for clothes.
C) It is important to fit in with your peers.
D) It is more important to be send out the right image than to express your personality.
E) Whether you like it or not, people will judge you by what your appearances.
The opera and the ballet - pick the statement that best describes your experiences.
A) Not interested at all.
B) I've seen some clips on Youtube - does that count?
C) I have been a few times in my life.
D) If there's a famous ballet/opera in town, I'd go watch for sure.
E) I have friends who work in the opera/ballet so I feel obliged to support my friends.
I could go on but these 20 questions ought to be more than enough for us to determine plenty about your social status. Look, this is very low tech, I could try to use Facebook to create a more interactive survey type experience, but heck, I think you guys pretty much know that the whole purpose of this post is to point out to most people that they are not as posh as they think they are and there's a huge difference between having money and spending your money to enrich your cultural experiences. So what have your answers been?
Mostly As: Traditional poor working class
Your very limited social experiences has a lot to do with your lack of financial resources: in short, you're living the life of a very poor person who hasn't had the benefit of a decent education. To broaden one's horizons, travel the world, meet new people from around the world, to seek brand new experiences - well all that takes money and the more you experience you gain, the more in common you may have with others who do have the means to see and explore the world and appreciate the finer things in life. Your cultural experiences are as barren as the driest desert: when you do have money you are only interested in things that feed the stomach rather than the mind. By that token, the only people you have much in common with are those who are equally trapped by their poverty - that means you will often seek solace in their company and thus your extremely limited social circle. People who are different from you faze you and you don't know how to talk to them. I can't even think about anything to say to people in this category because any kind of advice about broadening their horizons is pointless as they just don't have the money to do things like that - so I usually just smile, back off and leave them to their own devices. You can't change people in this category.
Mostly Bs: Mindset of the working class, with some money
This is a more interesting group because I have some experience with them: namely, my parents. Now my parents have an extremely working class mindset yet because of their children and the generous state pension as civil servants, they are financially very comfortable. They can afford the luxuries in life, yet they have no interest at all in trying to improve the cultural contents of their lives to make their lifestyles more similar to the middle or upper classes. There is a funny story from the UK about this working class couple (ie. from the previous category) winning the lottery, hence bumping them up into this category with a sudden windfall. What did they do? They bought the most garish looking gold jewelry in vast quantities and posed for the media with their new gold hardware. Well guess what happened? A few days later, some thieves broke into their home and robbed them of about £11,000 worth of gold. Geez, who in the right mind would have that amount of gold just sitting around in the house, just waiting to be robbed? This couple have children for crying out aloud - how about investing in your children's education instead and giving them a better future? Nope, you choose to buy gold jewelry. People like that have the money to make social mobility a reality for themselves and their children, but they are stubbornly set in their ways with a "there's absolutely nothing wrong to be working class, I am proud to be working class". So even if they have money, it is rarely spent on things like education for their children.
Mostly Cs: The middle ground, the middle class
This is where most people will find themselves: the middle ground. These are people who have some money but are probably not that wealthy, but they have wisely invested their money in things like education and experiences that will enrich their lives (rather than say, gold jewelry). But then, classically in the case of Singapore, the focus is overwhelmingly on education: so you have parents who work extremely hard just to be able to get their children the best tuition teacher in the country - "Mr Tan has a great reputation, I know he charges more than everyone else, but it will be worth it if it will help my daughter get into NUS medical school at the end of the day." In such cases, the amount of money available for their children's education is limited, so tuition will always take priority over say that trip to Paris or that visit to the opera or tennis lessons. Well, this is simply a function of the parents trying to be very pragmatic when resources are limited - you can't say yes to everything so they can only spend the money on what they prioritize as the most important. Such noble Singaporean parents will never allow themselves luxuries like gold jewelry but they also have their blind spots: they neglect the cultural elements to their children's education thus their children may have excellent results, but still have little in common with those from more privileged backgrounds whose parents have placed a lot more emphasis on a more varied cultural experience. This often results in situations where the lack of soft skills (rather than the lack of academic qualifications) holds these people back from social progression to the next class.
Mostly Ds: The new emerging elites
These people have the best of both worlds: they had a good education and they have also had the good sense to dedicate enough time and money to the cultural aspects of their experiences. They have probably realized that you cannot get by in life purely with good academic grades, you need to have soft skills - after all, your university results may impact on the way you get your first job, but soft skills will serve you for life. I would place myself in this category: I was born to parents in the 'mostly Bs' category, but I was able to make very strategic choices for myself because I realized that whilst my parents didn't care about social mobility, I actually do and if I didn't want a life like theirs, then I had to do a lot of things they never did before or even thought of - such as go live and work in Paris. On the surface, you may find it hard to distinguish between people of the 'mostly Cs' and 'mostly Ds' category: that is because they probably have roughly the same amount of wealth, but the difference lies in their ability to mix with the next group. It is January, would you be able to participate in a conversation about where you will be going skiing this season? Or will you get a polite smile when you confess to have never been? What differentiates those in this category from the next is the role of the parents: we are a product of social mobility whilst those in the next category were born with a silver spoon in their mouths.
Mostly Es: The well-established elites
Few Singaporeans are in this category: they are very likely to have parents who are themselves very rich and well-educated, they have not only access to the wealth to buy them the best education available, but also had the opportunity to do all the leisure activities from sailing to skiing to golf to exotic holidays that the rich take for granted. Such elites naturally feel a sense of connection to others who have had a similarly privileged upbringing or at least to those in the previous category with whom they have enough common ground for some kind of social connection. Thus such people rarely feel tied to one place and their nationality is almost incidental: you see, someone from the 'mostly As' category will feel a strong sense of local identity as a Singaporean because that's all they have known all their lives and there's nothing else that defines them. Whereas someone from this well-established elite category would have lived, studied and worked around the world, they have friends from many countries and have the social skills to mingle with the elites whether they are in New York, Seoul, Berlin or Sydney. It is their wealth and privilege that ultimately defines them on a global scale.
You see, that's the biggest fault I find with the NUS survey. They only looked at the social connections on a very local scale, pointing out that rich people in Singapore tend to befriend other rich people in Singapore - that those who went to elite schools will only befriend those from other elite schools; that may describe those from the 'mostly Cs or Ds' categories but what about those whose social networks expand far beyond the confines of Singapore. Indeed, given the way so many Singaporeans have studied and worked abroad and have friends from all over the world, given the way our social interactions are very much done via social media these days, this survey ignores many aspects of the way Singaporeans make friends in 2018. It also ignores another important group of people in Singapore: expatriates/foreigners. There are 5.75 million people in Singapore of which, only 3.9 million are citizens: what about the 1.85 million foreigners in our midst then? How do you classify say an Australian or Filipino expat when it comes to the 'elite school' category? The methodology behind this survey is deeply flawed - so, there's perhaps a use for my useless geography degree after all.
Now finally, I am sure you want to know my results. Well I scored 12 Es, 6Ds, 2Cs. The two questions where I scored the Cs on were those about sailing and flying first class. So on reflection, perhaps I probably do belong more to the 'mostly Es' category than I thought, it wouldn't have been where I placed myself since I had to acquire all of the social privileges I have today as an adult, with no help at all from my parents who are in the 'mostly Bs' category. I still think there's a gap between me and those who would score mostly Es in this test: I remember a conversation in the office when a colleague talked about meeting Margaret Thatcher, the prime minister then, when his father went to Buckingham Palace to get his OBE from the Queen. Yeah. How the hell am I ever going to 'compete' with people like that when it comes to being posh and having privilege? It takes more than a generation to accumulate that much social privilege, if I had a child (hypothetically, I have no desire ever to become a father), then I could very easily pass all this social privilege onto my offspring so s/he would have an incredible head start in life, rather than have to battle the odds the way I had to. So that's it from me on this topic: what do you think? How did you score in this quiz? How would you define your social class? Leave a comment below, many thanks for reading.
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| How do you define social class in modern Singapore? |
One thing I want to explain today is that class isn't the same thing has having money - although the link between wealth and class is complex. The classic example I would use is the ugly PRC-Chinese tourist (ie. from mainland China, as opposed to from say Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan or HK) who clearly has a lot of money but doesn't have the basic social graces and ends up doing something embarrassing like urinating in a very public place. That is perhaps a rather extreme example, but sometimes an extreme example is useful to illustrate points like that. So you see, social class is more than about what your bank balance is, whether you are rich or poor, but which segment of society you belong to. This is not something you can define for yourself: I can claim to be as fine as royalty if that's how I wish to define myself, but that definition is simply not a reasonable nor valid one since I clearly do not have much in common with the royal family. The BBC did a very interesting study about this topic back in 2013 with the BBC Great Class Calculator where it asked respondents a series of questions which would then decide which of seven social classes you belonged to. I didn't quite like that calculator for two reasons: I thought they didn't go into enough detail with the questions and that there just too few classes - surely you can't reduce the complexity of our society into just seven classes today?
Having wealth is a start, but what you do with that wealth is what defines your social class - allow me to explain. In the UK where we have been obsessed with defining people by their social class for centuries, we would ask innocent sounding questions to try to identify patterns in your life to determine what social class you belong to. What do you do for leisure? What kind of education did you have? Do you have access to expensive luxurious activities like golf or skiing? Do you spend your money accessing high culture or mass entertainment - say you have £2000 to spend on a weekend, do you go to get best seats for the opera or go watch a football match? Your choice of going high or low brow would probably be determined by what your peers would think of your choice - so you see, it goes way beyond doing stuff that makes you happy with your money, it has got a lot more to do with whom you're trying to identify with. Let's not even pretend that everyone is equal, but I don't think equality is the issue here: we're all extremely different, unique individuals and we naturally seek to form meaningful relationships with people whom we identify with. Now this could be pretty much determined by your parents and upbringing, or it could turn out to be the complete opposite (as in my case) - a hurrah for social mobility. We're all different - that much we can agree on - but let's look at how we are different.
 |
| Even if you have money, how do you choose to spend it? |
Thus on that basis, I am going to offer Limpeh's Singapore 2018 class survey which is pretty much based on the 2013 BBC Great Class Calculator. The problem with the NUS survey is that it only makes comparisons within Singapore - such as comparing those who went to elite schools to those who haven't. In 2018, you need to look at this on a more global scale: you can't put someone who went to Harvard in the same category as someone who went to NUS - they clearly belong in two different categories even if they did go to the same secondary school. And of course we're far more likely to have friends from the same social class, then say someone of the same ethnicity, religion or nationality. This is all meant to offend most Singaporeans who think they are very atas when really, they are at best struggling middle class or just plain plebs. So if you have a thick skin and are ready to be insulted, here are my 20 questions for you:
Your financial situation
What is your personal income in the last financial year?
A) Under $20,000
B) Between $20,000 to $40,000
C) Between $40,000 to $80,000
D) Between $80,000 to $150,000
E) over $150,000
Do you own or rent property?
A) I live with my parents
B) I rent my current premises.
C) I have a mortgage for my first flat.
D) I have a buy to let on top of my current dwelling.
E) I have several properties.
Have you any savings (excluding CPF as you can't easily access it if you want to)?
A) None
B) up to $10k
C) up to $50k
D) up to $200k
E) over $200k
Pick the statement that best describes your current situation with your relationship with your bank.
A) I am in a lot of debt - my card keeps getting rejected.
B) I am just use the ordinary banking services like most people.
C) I have a mortgage with my bank.
D) I have access to premium banking services as a HNWI (high net worth individual).
E) I have my own private banker.
Your education
Where did you get your degree from?
A) My degree is not worth the paper it is printed on because I went to a private university like SIM.
B) I don't have a degree. That's right, you're better off not having a degree than having one from SIM.
C) NUS/NTU/SIM
D) A foreign university the equivalent of top 10 in UK/US.
E) Cambridge/Oxford/Ivy League/or equivalent in a country like Japan, Korea, France or Germany.
Have you had the chance to study abroad?
A) No, never.
B) I have at least had a teacher from another country.
C) I have spent at least a term abroad on exchange.
D) I did my degree abroad.
E) Not only did I do my degree abroad, I was educated in more than three countries, in more than three languages.
Did you ever study a foreign language during or before the completion of your degree? (And no, your L2 such as Malay, Tamil or Chinese does not count).
A) No, never.
B) I took some lessons.
C) I have the equivalent of A levels in a foreign language.
D) I am totally fluent in a foreign language.
E) Not only am I fluent in at least two foreign languages, I did part of my degree in a foreign language.
Did you ever learn a musical instrument during or before the age of 18?
A) No, never.
B) I took some lessons, but never any exams.
C) I completed a few exams.
D) I completed all the exams for a minimum of 8 years.
E) I did all the exams for more than one instrument.
Seeing the world
How many countries have you visited?
A) Under 10
B) 11 - 25
C) 25 - 45
D) 45 - 60
E) More than 60
How often do you travel?
A) Hardly ever
B) Once a year on average
C) A few times a year
D) About ten times a year
E) Every month, sometimes twice a month
What do you buy when you are abroad?
A) Point me to the nearest designer discount factory outlet
B) I just go to the usual souvenir shops
C) Usually food or drink that I enjoy
D) I spend money on memorable experiences like skydiving or going on a hot air balloon ride, but I don't need more possessions to clutter up my life.
E) I make a contribution a local charity that has inspired me.
How do you decide where you stay when on holiday?
A) Value for money - I want bargains
B) I want it to be convenient for transport, so near a bus or train station.
C) I want it to be near the major sites I wish to see.
D) It needs to be luxury, it is a holiday after all.
E) It needs to be too expensive for the plebs to afford, I don't want their company.
Your friends and social experiences
Which statement best describes your social circle:
A) I have very few or no friends.
B) Manual workers with blue collar jobs
C) A mix of blue and white collar workers, but mostly blue
D) A mix of blue and white collar workers, but mostly white
E) Exclusively white collar workers
Have you ever been invited to a reception at an embassy?
A) Yes, as a cleaner, I clean all venues including some embassies.
B) No, that will never happen.
C) I have been to a party hosted by a foreigner, but it wasn't at the embassy but some fancy restaurant, does that count?
D) Yes I have been once or twice, for work.
E) Yes, regularly, I get bored with those events.
Have you ever been skiing?
A) The closest I will get to seeing snow is having an ice-kachang.
B) I have once spent an hour at Snow City Jurong, does that count?
C) I have been once several years ago.
D) I have been a few times.
E) I ski several times a year.
Have you ever been sailing on a private yacht?
A) I have taken the ferry to Batam does that count?
B) I've been on the yacht, but it has never left the harbour.
C) I have been invited to do so a few times.
D) I do so regularly.
E) I have my own private yacht.
Have you ever flown first class?
A) I have never been on a plane.
B) No, never - only economy, I buy the cheapest tickets.
C) I have flown business class.
D) I do so regularly.
E) Yes but I prefer my private jet.
How would you describe the nationalities of your friends?
A) They are all locals.
B) They are mostly locals with a few foreigners.
C) They are a good mix of people from around the world plus locals.
D) They are mostly foreigners with a few locals.
E) They are all social elites, when you're an elite your nationality is inconsequential.
Pick the statement that best describes your attitude towards fashion.
A) Comfort is most important to me.
B) I like to get value for money when shopping for clothes.
C) It is important to fit in with your peers.
D) It is more important to be send out the right image than to express your personality.
E) Whether you like it or not, people will judge you by what your appearances.
The opera and the ballet - pick the statement that best describes your experiences.
A) Not interested at all.
B) I've seen some clips on Youtube - does that count?
C) I have been a few times in my life.
D) If there's a famous ballet/opera in town, I'd go watch for sure.
E) I have friends who work in the opera/ballet so I feel obliged to support my friends.
I could go on but these 20 questions ought to be more than enough for us to determine plenty about your social status. Look, this is very low tech, I could try to use Facebook to create a more interactive survey type experience, but heck, I think you guys pretty much know that the whole purpose of this post is to point out to most people that they are not as posh as they think they are and there's a huge difference between having money and spending your money to enrich your cultural experiences. So what have your answers been?
 |
| This is about how you spend, not how much you have. |
Mostly As: Traditional poor working class
Your very limited social experiences has a lot to do with your lack of financial resources: in short, you're living the life of a very poor person who hasn't had the benefit of a decent education. To broaden one's horizons, travel the world, meet new people from around the world, to seek brand new experiences - well all that takes money and the more you experience you gain, the more in common you may have with others who do have the means to see and explore the world and appreciate the finer things in life. Your cultural experiences are as barren as the driest desert: when you do have money you are only interested in things that feed the stomach rather than the mind. By that token, the only people you have much in common with are those who are equally trapped by their poverty - that means you will often seek solace in their company and thus your extremely limited social circle. People who are different from you faze you and you don't know how to talk to them. I can't even think about anything to say to people in this category because any kind of advice about broadening their horizons is pointless as they just don't have the money to do things like that - so I usually just smile, back off and leave them to their own devices. You can't change people in this category.
Mostly Bs: Mindset of the working class, with some money
This is a more interesting group because I have some experience with them: namely, my parents. Now my parents have an extremely working class mindset yet because of their children and the generous state pension as civil servants, they are financially very comfortable. They can afford the luxuries in life, yet they have no interest at all in trying to improve the cultural contents of their lives to make their lifestyles more similar to the middle or upper classes. There is a funny story from the UK about this working class couple (ie. from the previous category) winning the lottery, hence bumping them up into this category with a sudden windfall. What did they do? They bought the most garish looking gold jewelry in vast quantities and posed for the media with their new gold hardware. Well guess what happened? A few days later, some thieves broke into their home and robbed them of about £11,000 worth of gold. Geez, who in the right mind would have that amount of gold just sitting around in the house, just waiting to be robbed? This couple have children for crying out aloud - how about investing in your children's education instead and giving them a better future? Nope, you choose to buy gold jewelry. People like that have the money to make social mobility a reality for themselves and their children, but they are stubbornly set in their ways with a "there's absolutely nothing wrong to be working class, I am proud to be working class". So even if they have money, it is rarely spent on things like education for their children.
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| Would you invest in your children's education? |
Mostly Cs: The middle ground, the middle class
This is where most people will find themselves: the middle ground. These are people who have some money but are probably not that wealthy, but they have wisely invested their money in things like education and experiences that will enrich their lives (rather than say, gold jewelry). But then, classically in the case of Singapore, the focus is overwhelmingly on education: so you have parents who work extremely hard just to be able to get their children the best tuition teacher in the country - "Mr Tan has a great reputation, I know he charges more than everyone else, but it will be worth it if it will help my daughter get into NUS medical school at the end of the day." In such cases, the amount of money available for their children's education is limited, so tuition will always take priority over say that trip to Paris or that visit to the opera or tennis lessons. Well, this is simply a function of the parents trying to be very pragmatic when resources are limited - you can't say yes to everything so they can only spend the money on what they prioritize as the most important. Such noble Singaporean parents will never allow themselves luxuries like gold jewelry but they also have their blind spots: they neglect the cultural elements to their children's education thus their children may have excellent results, but still have little in common with those from more privileged backgrounds whose parents have placed a lot more emphasis on a more varied cultural experience. This often results in situations where the lack of soft skills (rather than the lack of academic qualifications) holds these people back from social progression to the next class.
Mostly Ds: The new emerging elites
These people have the best of both worlds: they had a good education and they have also had the good sense to dedicate enough time and money to the cultural aspects of their experiences. They have probably realized that you cannot get by in life purely with good academic grades, you need to have soft skills - after all, your university results may impact on the way you get your first job, but soft skills will serve you for life. I would place myself in this category: I was born to parents in the 'mostly Bs' category, but I was able to make very strategic choices for myself because I realized that whilst my parents didn't care about social mobility, I actually do and if I didn't want a life like theirs, then I had to do a lot of things they never did before or even thought of - such as go live and work in Paris. On the surface, you may find it hard to distinguish between people of the 'mostly Cs' and 'mostly Ds' category: that is because they probably have roughly the same amount of wealth, but the difference lies in their ability to mix with the next group. It is January, would you be able to participate in a conversation about where you will be going skiing this season? Or will you get a polite smile when you confess to have never been? What differentiates those in this category from the next is the role of the parents: we are a product of social mobility whilst those in the next category were born with a silver spoon in their mouths.
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| How far up the property ladder are you? |
Mostly Es: The well-established elites
Few Singaporeans are in this category: they are very likely to have parents who are themselves very rich and well-educated, they have not only access to the wealth to buy them the best education available, but also had the opportunity to do all the leisure activities from sailing to skiing to golf to exotic holidays that the rich take for granted. Such elites naturally feel a sense of connection to others who have had a similarly privileged upbringing or at least to those in the previous category with whom they have enough common ground for some kind of social connection. Thus such people rarely feel tied to one place and their nationality is almost incidental: you see, someone from the 'mostly As' category will feel a strong sense of local identity as a Singaporean because that's all they have known all their lives and there's nothing else that defines them. Whereas someone from this well-established elite category would have lived, studied and worked around the world, they have friends from many countries and have the social skills to mingle with the elites whether they are in New York, Seoul, Berlin or Sydney. It is their wealth and privilege that ultimately defines them on a global scale.
You see, that's the biggest fault I find with the NUS survey. They only looked at the social connections on a very local scale, pointing out that rich people in Singapore tend to befriend other rich people in Singapore - that those who went to elite schools will only befriend those from other elite schools; that may describe those from the 'mostly Cs or Ds' categories but what about those whose social networks expand far beyond the confines of Singapore. Indeed, given the way so many Singaporeans have studied and worked abroad and have friends from all over the world, given the way our social interactions are very much done via social media these days, this survey ignores many aspects of the way Singaporeans make friends in 2018. It also ignores another important group of people in Singapore: expatriates/foreigners. There are 5.75 million people in Singapore of which, only 3.9 million are citizens: what about the 1.85 million foreigners in our midst then? How do you classify say an Australian or Filipino expat when it comes to the 'elite school' category? The methodology behind this survey is deeply flawed - so, there's perhaps a use for my useless geography degree after all.
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| What is the best way to categorize social class in Singapore today? |
Now finally, I am sure you want to know my results. Well I scored 12 Es, 6Ds, 2Cs. The two questions where I scored the Cs on were those about sailing and flying first class. So on reflection, perhaps I probably do belong more to the 'mostly Es' category than I thought, it wouldn't have been where I placed myself since I had to acquire all of the social privileges I have today as an adult, with no help at all from my parents who are in the 'mostly Bs' category. I still think there's a gap between me and those who would score mostly Es in this test: I remember a conversation in the office when a colleague talked about meeting Margaret Thatcher, the prime minister then, when his father went to Buckingham Palace to get his OBE from the Queen. Yeah. How the hell am I ever going to 'compete' with people like that when it comes to being posh and having privilege? It takes more than a generation to accumulate that much social privilege, if I had a child (hypothetically, I have no desire ever to become a father), then I could very easily pass all this social privilege onto my offspring so s/he would have an incredible head start in life, rather than have to battle the odds the way I had to. So that's it from me on this topic: what do you think? How did you score in this quiz? How would you define your social class? Leave a comment below, many thanks for reading.
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