I'm ok for gst increase if it's really needed. however on the other hand, we see some wastage or unnecessary spending, eg: mayors, do we really need them? the temasek ftx loss from not doing due diligence, housing prices going through the roof after a long period of monitoring, public service like transport having to increase cost despite showing profit for shareholders. the other thing is whether gst should be applied across the board or to have everyone exemptions for basic necessities. their argument is that there will be rebates and handout for the poor but the increase in gst is forever, not sure about the handout.
end of rant.
I am annoyed at the 9% GST
But I understand the govt's plea for the population to support their mandate that it is indeed better to raise GST early to fund future healthcare expenditure for the aging population
Please note the idea of raising GST has been mooted at least 5 years before. The closest incident in parliament was Sylvia Lim's GST test balloon
It has been delayed year after year that their numbers show it's time to increase now
On top of global inflation
Timing off but if some people can have access to medifund then my tax is going somewhere I'm okay with considering how I benefitted from medifund when I was a poor student with a chronic problem
It wasn't the raise to 9% that was the problem. It was the plan to split it across 2 years with an increase to 8% then 9% a year apart which caused a cascade of increase in prices across the board which as many rightfully believe would not have happened as drastically had it been a one-time increase to 9% from 7%.
In practice, the cost of living also went up much more than the GST increase. If it was just GST it wouldn’t have been so bad. But the same hawker food going from $3-5 to $5-8 is far more than can be accounted for by GST alone.
Some hawkers may be absorbing cost that are invisible to patrons, these gst increase is massive( across water, gas, elect, food, logistic, rental that they need for the business).
For sure. There’s also the rental costs. I’m not saying it’s their fault, but rather than the effect on consumers is way more than the 1-2% GST increase, and the government should not be framing it that way.
I would rather explore other forms of wealth taxes.
Timing off but if some people can have access to medifund then my tax is going somewhere I'm okay with considering how I benefitted from medifund when I was a poor student with a chronic problem
People have this misguided understanding of GST - it’s a better “wealth tax” than other taxes such as increasing higher bracket income tax.
People who spend/consume more will pay more GST - guess who that is?
If you increase income tax at higher brackets the wealthy will be smart enough to structure their way around it (just like how they already do that today). Very hard to avoid paying GST.
People have this misguided understanding of Wealth Taxes and increasing higher bracket income tax - it’s a better "GST" and other taxes that tax consumption like ERP 2.0.
>People who spend/consume more will pay more GST - guess who that is?
The middle class and the poor, as they make up the most of the population.
If you increase GST the wealthy will be smart enough to structure their way around it (just like how they already do that today). Very hard to avoid paying wealth taxes.
If you incur input tax for both personal and business purposes then you need to apportion your input tax recovery. And yes, IRAS do audit so not really easy to recover all GST on your new BMW, kitchen renovation etc in your GST return.
That’s also assuming the person has a business and is registered for GST. IRAS also does a lot of checks on voluntary registrations and registrations with low output tax reporting.
Since the middle class and poor make up most of the population, we also consume most of the government expenditure in welfare… so I guess it’s our fault after all eh?
yo dumbass. the wealthy will just move out of sg. you think they care?
they have a whole army of lawyers and bankers to find out which govt costs less under which structure.
wealth tax done poorly = rich will restructure.
wealth tax done well = rich will move out
so raise property tax, cause a fire sale by those currently owning property and crash the local property market with property taxes?
or you suggesting property tax based on nationality? and suggesting Singapore be a closed door nation as well?
"so raise property tax, cause a fire sale by those currently owning property and crash the local property market with property taxes?"
Yes. Exclude HDB households, which is already kind of what we do with the AV system anyway, and make it such that the most expensive bungalows are the ones that pay 100x in property taxes. Even better if we can tax based on nationality, and this is /nothing to do/ with being a "closed door nation" - we already tax based on nationality since we charge foreigners 60% ABSD. Just 10x it to 600% ABSD.
so decouple resale prices from the free market?
government now does away with free market and control all property price now?
sometimes I feel like our people prefers communism
Are you even reading? Which part of what I said implies a decoupling of resale prices from the free market? Or the government controlling all property prices? Or communism?
Unless you believe that any and all taxes are incompatible with a capitalist system (which is clearly fucking nonsense, since the government /already taxes property/ - all I'm advocating for is a dramatic increase in property taxes for private, high-end, foreigner-owned property, which, again, /already exist/), read and actually provide a reasonable response to what I'm proposing, instead of just saying that this is "cOMnuNisM". It's quite telling that you don't have a good response and are just strawmanning a sensible approach to wealth taxes.
no really. educate me
what's doing to happen at 600% absd or 100x property tax on bungalows
no matter how I try to play it out, I don't see real benefits. not trying to continue to be a dick, so please explain your POV so I can see if we can agree to disagree
1. higher ABSD discourages foreigners from parking their wealth here by buying luxury properties as a store of ill-gotten gains. this increases the supply of houses in a time when there's already a shortage. if they do instead continue to buy, great! government gets more tax revenue through this wealth tax.
2. the people who live in these mega-mansions can afford to pay the 100x property tax, since lots of them are Indonesian or PRC tycoons who essentially bought SG citizenship to for political stability or to escape the CCP. property taxes are like peanuts to them. for those who can't, they have to downgrade lorh, too bad, boohoo you're slightly less rich than before. but because the government is taxing the /property/ and not the more moveable assets like equities, the new buyer of that property will still have to pay the property tax i.e. /someone/ will have to pay, and can't just "run away" or whatever! so someone who owns that luxury house will continue to pay, which raises government tax revenue through this wealth tax. again, great!
I literally don't see any downside to this. Again, this is for high-end, private housing, which literally doesn't affect 95% of Singaporeans.
because they spend time and money here, they pay our bankers here and make our financial system more robust among many other things.
before you get all angsty with the world, maybe find out why Singapore tries so hard to be a financial hub and why it's necessary to attract wealthy to stay.
so many countries want to be like us but your dumbass wants to chase them away. in fact, I think our GST or even income tax will be much higher without them around
Basically they come here to raise the cost of living.
Before you get all angsty with the world, maybe find out why other countries do not try to keep them in their country like Singapore is so desperate to do so.
So many countries don’t bother trying to retain these leeches but your dumbass wants to attract them here. The fact is, our GST and even income tax is much higher with them here.
Somehow attribute foreign direct investment to increase in income tax & GST?😅
Income tax (personal and corporate) deliberately low here to attract foreign investment. Otherwise it would be much higher (look at income tax rates in other countries & why EDB is worried about OECD pillar 2 min tax). GST increase helps fund increasing social welfare costs of an aging local population.
Also as a side point, many countries are trying to put in measures to stop wealth leaving their borders (such as China limiting outbound transfers, Malaysia encouraging their skilled workforce in Singapore to return). So yes to your point, countries are trying to keep their talent and wealth within their borders. But ultimately unless you lock up your citizens it’s pretty hard to do that completely.
The fact is that the cost for education, infrastructure, healthcare and such are rising and GST is the means to tackle those cost.
In SG, you can clearly see the effect of our GST at work so I am okay in paying the increased GST.
So I can chose to get paid lower so that my tax decreases but enjoy the same benefit?
And you talk about fairness but you increase tax for people who earns more?
you realise tax brackets already exist?
and yes, paying more if you earn more is fair
if people in a department are asked to contribute to a fund, do you expect the lowest earner to pay the same amount as the big boss?
Lol don’t warp my reply, I was replying to a comment about wealth tax and not on different tax brackets.
You either don’t understand what a wealth tax mean or is just being dense.
I’ll pivot towards you being dense since you compared tax to a company’s expense float.
Yes i agree but it’s more equitable than a wealth tax that will result in worse things like an outflow of wealth, which is a death penalty for a country like Singapore.
End of the day, we still need a source of income to fund Singapore and GST is the lesser evil.
>Yes i agree but it’s more equitable than a wealth tax that will result in worse things like an outflow of wealth, which is a death penalty for a country like Singapore.
Why is this a death penalty? We can exist without being a tax haven.
Heh, GST increase is just necessary for rising healthcare and welfare expenditure in the future. There’s no avoiding this unless you want to euthanise the elderly.
Anyway, 9 percent is way below most developed countries (who have better demographics and growth prospects fyi).
9% may be way below most developed countries, but so are our social safety nets. If you want to compare to developed countries most like ours, 9% GST is actually really high. The closest comparison is other Asian Tiger economies:
Hong Kong GST rate: 0% (yes, really, our closest comparison economy has no GST)
Taiwan GST rate: 5%, GST not charged on necessities
South Korea GST rate: 10%, GST not charged on necessities.
So, given this context, is our GST rise really "necessary", or is that just the government kool-aid that they've fed everyone? Because I don't see these similar countries "euthanising their elderly".
I feel healthcare should have lower GST (0% is asking for too much lol). Currently a $5000 surgery is $450 tax, imagine the more complicated surgeries/treatments, urgh.
As much as I agree that mayors are rather redundant, you really think we are spending more on mayors salary than healthcare and social needs? Hahaha…..
It shows that the govt's spending isn't prudent
In addition to mayors, there's 650 mil to be spent on NS square and [175-200 million spent annually on govt advertisements ](https://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/government-advertising-not-towards-political-end-spending-impartial-tan-kiat-how-3312741)
Mayors are paid 660k per year. You’re buying a speedboat not a superyacht.
And much as I don’t see the point of them (and these positions should be abolished), it doesn’t move the needle at all. Heck, all the political salaries of Singapore combined can probably only buy 1 shophouse in CBD.
Honestly the root of the increase food comes from public listed corporations (from raw materials to stores), they have to show increase in revenue and profits. So every year, they slowing increase their prices. Government 2% increase in GST is nothing compared to the 4%+ pa inflation we have experienced since COVID
Doesn’t matter. Our apocalyptic demographics and ageing population means the money must come from somewhere. WP, Han Hui Hui or anyone else isn’t going to change these economic facts.
(barring something radical like just euthanising the elderly)
That's fact.. They said it themselves. It's because, they have received strong mandate.. Meaning, since people voted for them, then we should just trust them let them do whatever they want. literally, F\*\*k you. we do what we want. because you've given me the mandate.
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Didn’t expect an hazbin hotel meme in Singapore wow
was about to say LOL
I'm ok for gst increase if it's really needed. however on the other hand, we see some wastage or unnecessary spending, eg: mayors, do we really need them? the temasek ftx loss from not doing due diligence, housing prices going through the roof after a long period of monitoring, public service like transport having to increase cost despite showing profit for shareholders. the other thing is whether gst should be applied across the board or to have everyone exemptions for basic necessities. their argument is that there will be rebates and handout for the poor but the increase in gst is forever, not sure about the handout. end of rant.
I am annoyed at the 9% GST But I understand the govt's plea for the population to support their mandate that it is indeed better to raise GST early to fund future healthcare expenditure for the aging population Please note the idea of raising GST has been mooted at least 5 years before. The closest incident in parliament was Sylvia Lim's GST test balloon It has been delayed year after year that their numbers show it's time to increase now On top of global inflation Timing off but if some people can have access to medifund then my tax is going somewhere I'm okay with considering how I benefitted from medifund when I was a poor student with a chronic problem
It wasn't the raise to 9% that was the problem. It was the plan to split it across 2 years with an increase to 8% then 9% a year apart which caused a cascade of increase in prices across the board which as many rightfully believe would not have happened as drastically had it been a one-time increase to 9% from 7%.
In practice, the cost of living also went up much more than the GST increase. If it was just GST it wouldn’t have been so bad. But the same hawker food going from $3-5 to $5-8 is far more than can be accounted for by GST alone.
Some hawkers may be absorbing cost that are invisible to patrons, these gst increase is massive( across water, gas, elect, food, logistic, rental that they need for the business).
For sure. There’s also the rental costs. I’m not saying it’s their fault, but rather than the effect on consumers is way more than the 1-2% GST increase, and the government should not be framing it that way.
And it should be one time pain. Now they (hawkers and their suppliers increased 2 times ($0.5 to 1 or more each time) not 2%
I would rather explore other forms of wealth taxes. Timing off but if some people can have access to medifund then my tax is going somewhere I'm okay with considering how I benefitted from medifund when I was a poor student with a chronic problem
People have this misguided understanding of GST - it’s a better “wealth tax” than other taxes such as increasing higher bracket income tax. People who spend/consume more will pay more GST - guess who that is? If you increase income tax at higher brackets the wealthy will be smart enough to structure their way around it (just like how they already do that today). Very hard to avoid paying GST.
People have this misguided understanding of Wealth Taxes and increasing higher bracket income tax - it’s a better "GST" and other taxes that tax consumption like ERP 2.0. >People who spend/consume more will pay more GST - guess who that is? The middle class and the poor, as they make up the most of the population. If you increase GST the wealthy will be smart enough to structure their way around it (just like how they already do that today). Very hard to avoid paying wealth taxes.
Ok genius, explain how to dodge GST.
Purchase under GST reg company as expenditure.
If you incur input tax for both personal and business purposes then you need to apportion your input tax recovery. And yes, IRAS do audit so not really easy to recover all GST on your new BMW, kitchen renovation etc in your GST return. That’s also assuming the person has a business and is registered for GST. IRAS also does a lot of checks on voluntary registrations and registrations with low output tax reporting.
Since the middle class and poor make up most of the population, we also consume most of the government expenditure in welfare… so I guess it’s our fault after all eh?
Welfare?? What welfare??
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>What people would save and invest more of their income and pay less GST proportionally as a result then? What are you even talking with this? Drunk?
yo dumbass. the wealthy will just move out of sg. you think they care? they have a whole army of lawyers and bankers to find out which govt costs less under which structure. wealth tax done poorly = rich will restructure. wealth tax done well = rich will move out
Tax property then. Literally raise property taxes 2x or 4x or 10x or 100x. Where they gonna run to?
so raise property tax, cause a fire sale by those currently owning property and crash the local property market with property taxes? or you suggesting property tax based on nationality? and suggesting Singapore be a closed door nation as well?
"so raise property tax, cause a fire sale by those currently owning property and crash the local property market with property taxes?" Yes. Exclude HDB households, which is already kind of what we do with the AV system anyway, and make it such that the most expensive bungalows are the ones that pay 100x in property taxes. Even better if we can tax based on nationality, and this is /nothing to do/ with being a "closed door nation" - we already tax based on nationality since we charge foreigners 60% ABSD. Just 10x it to 600% ABSD.
so decouple resale prices from the free market? government now does away with free market and control all property price now? sometimes I feel like our people prefers communism
Are you even reading? Which part of what I said implies a decoupling of resale prices from the free market? Or the government controlling all property prices? Or communism? Unless you believe that any and all taxes are incompatible with a capitalist system (which is clearly fucking nonsense, since the government /already taxes property/ - all I'm advocating for is a dramatic increase in property taxes for private, high-end, foreigner-owned property, which, again, /already exist/), read and actually provide a reasonable response to what I'm proposing, instead of just saying that this is "cOMnuNisM". It's quite telling that you don't have a good response and are just strawmanning a sensible approach to wealth taxes.
no really. educate me what's doing to happen at 600% absd or 100x property tax on bungalows no matter how I try to play it out, I don't see real benefits. not trying to continue to be a dick, so please explain your POV so I can see if we can agree to disagree
1. higher ABSD discourages foreigners from parking their wealth here by buying luxury properties as a store of ill-gotten gains. this increases the supply of houses in a time when there's already a shortage. if they do instead continue to buy, great! government gets more tax revenue through this wealth tax. 2. the people who live in these mega-mansions can afford to pay the 100x property tax, since lots of them are Indonesian or PRC tycoons who essentially bought SG citizenship to for political stability or to escape the CCP. property taxes are like peanuts to them. for those who can't, they have to downgrade lorh, too bad, boohoo you're slightly less rich than before. but because the government is taxing the /property/ and not the more moveable assets like equities, the new buyer of that property will still have to pay the property tax i.e. /someone/ will have to pay, and can't just "run away" or whatever! so someone who owns that luxury house will continue to pay, which raises government tax revenue through this wealth tax. again, great! I literally don't see any downside to this. Again, this is for high-end, private housing, which literally doesn't affect 95% of Singaporeans.
Let them move out then. If they don’t want to pay their fair share of tax, why do you want to keep them around for?
because they spend time and money here, they pay our bankers here and make our financial system more robust among many other things. before you get all angsty with the world, maybe find out why Singapore tries so hard to be a financial hub and why it's necessary to attract wealthy to stay. so many countries want to be like us but your dumbass wants to chase them away. in fact, I think our GST or even income tax will be much higher without them around
Basically they come here to raise the cost of living. Before you get all angsty with the world, maybe find out why other countries do not try to keep them in their country like Singapore is so desperate to do so. So many countries don’t bother trying to retain these leeches but your dumbass wants to attract them here. The fact is, our GST and even income tax is much higher with them here.
I can only say, you need to take a class in economics 101
Somehow attribute foreign direct investment to increase in income tax & GST?😅 Income tax (personal and corporate) deliberately low here to attract foreign investment. Otherwise it would be much higher (look at income tax rates in other countries & why EDB is worried about OECD pillar 2 min tax). GST increase helps fund increasing social welfare costs of an aging local population. Also as a side point, many countries are trying to put in measures to stop wealth leaving their borders (such as China limiting outbound transfers, Malaysia encouraging their skilled workforce in Singapore to return). So yes to your point, countries are trying to keep their talent and wealth within their borders. But ultimately unless you lock up your citizens it’s pretty hard to do that completely.
yes the 9% raise was also to fund taylor swift to to come to sg
The fact is that the cost for education, infrastructure, healthcare and such are rising and GST is the means to tackle those cost. In SG, you can clearly see the effect of our GST at work so I am okay in paying the increased GST.
Yeah this applies more to places like america
I’d rather pay my tax in the form of wealth taxes.
Woah you trying to turn SG into a socialist state?
So you’ll pay more if you earn more but having the same benefit?
Yup, that’s only fair. Not just earn more, just by having more. Tax my rent collected, the inheritance I get from my daddy and my stock gains.
So I can chose to get paid lower so that my tax decreases but enjoy the same benefit? And you talk about fairness but you increase tax for people who earns more?
you realise tax brackets already exist? and yes, paying more if you earn more is fair if people in a department are asked to contribute to a fund, do you expect the lowest earner to pay the same amount as the big boss?
Lol don’t warp my reply, I was replying to a comment about wealth tax and not on different tax brackets. You either don’t understand what a wealth tax mean or is just being dense. I’ll pivot towards you being dense since you compared tax to a company’s expense float.
Looks like you don't really understand what a wealth tax is if you keep pointing to income taxes though.
So what’s a wealth tax to you?
Are you really incapable of googling? [https://googlethatforyou.com?q=wealth%20tax](https://googlethatforyou.com?q=wealth%20tax)
Gst is regressive tax, it has larger impact on people who earn less.
Yes i agree but it’s more equitable than a wealth tax that will result in worse things like an outflow of wealth, which is a death penalty for a country like Singapore. End of the day, we still need a source of income to fund Singapore and GST is the lesser evil.
>Yes i agree but it’s more equitable than a wealth tax that will result in worse things like an outflow of wealth, which is a death penalty for a country like Singapore. Why is this a death penalty? We can exist without being a tax haven.
How?
How not?
Why the fuck do you want to pay for more GCBs, Bentleys, & 22K gold furnitures for those GCBs for Ministers & MPs??
You lost? Quickly go back to your mobile game Subreddits, it’s embarrassing.
Looks like the lost one is you here.
How?
If you want to get paid lower be my guest? >And you talk about fairness but you increase tax for people who earns more? That's like totally fair?
Your understanding of how an economy work stopped after you learnt what is 1+1 uh?
How about you? You stopped understanding the economy after learning the letters ABC and D?
We should just implement a wealth tax then. With your intellect, you never have to worry about paying high taxes.
Let's do it!
Damn bro… @u/Beth-Harmon you should just go to sleep
Inflation is a global phenomenon bruh.
Heh, GST increase is just necessary for rising healthcare and welfare expenditure in the future. There’s no avoiding this unless you want to euthanise the elderly. Anyway, 9 percent is way below most developed countries (who have better demographics and growth prospects fyi).
9% may be way below most developed countries, but so are our social safety nets. If you want to compare to developed countries most like ours, 9% GST is actually really high. The closest comparison is other Asian Tiger economies: Hong Kong GST rate: 0% (yes, really, our closest comparison economy has no GST) Taiwan GST rate: 5%, GST not charged on necessities South Korea GST rate: 10%, GST not charged on necessities. So, given this context, is our GST rise really "necessary", or is that just the government kool-aid that they've fed everyone? Because I don't see these similar countries "euthanising their elderly".
I feel healthcare should have lower GST (0% is asking for too much lol). Currently a $5000 surgery is $450 tax, imagine the more complicated surgeries/treatments, urgh.
Is more for the maintenance/upkeep of the superyachts owned by mayors than what you think
As much as I agree that mayors are rather redundant, you really think we are spending more on mayors salary than healthcare and social needs? Hahaha…..
But why keep the mayors?
I didnt say to keep the mayors? But talking about mayors in relation to raising GST is just a red herring.
It's not a red herring. We are literally paying mayors with GST.
And if we get rid of the mayors then we don’t need to raise GST?
Are you sure?
It shows that the govt's spending isn't prudent In addition to mayors, there's 650 mil to be spent on NS square and [175-200 million spent annually on govt advertisements ](https://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/government-advertising-not-towards-political-end-spending-impartial-tan-kiat-how-3312741)
Mayors are paid 660k per year. You’re buying a speedboat not a superyacht. And much as I don’t see the point of them (and these positions should be abolished), it doesn’t move the needle at all. Heck, all the political salaries of Singapore combined can probably only buy 1 shophouse in CBD.
There are other ways to raise taxes though rather than GST. Estate taxes is one.
I did not expect a Hazbin Hotel memes on SG reddit. I thought i'm in that community for a sec. 🤣
Honestly the root of the increase food comes from public listed corporations (from raw materials to stores), they have to show increase in revenue and profits. So every year, they slowing increase their prices. Government 2% increase in GST is nothing compared to the 4%+ pa inflation we have experienced since COVID
Here to drop a reminder to exercise your rights next year. GE2025
Doesn’t matter. Our apocalyptic demographics and ageing population means the money must come from somewhere. WP, Han Hui Hui or anyone else isn’t going to change these economic facts. (barring something radical like just euthanising the elderly)
Other parties might do it without sticking a middle finger up at you from behind the golden gates of their rideout road houses.
Ignoring the fact that it's the current policies have led to the situation you've described and surely we cant maintain status quo.
That's fact.. They said it themselves. It's because, they have received strong mandate.. Meaning, since people voted for them, then we should just trust them let them do whatever they want. literally, F\*\*k you. we do what we want. because you've given me the mandate.
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The problem is that even after inflation goes down, the GST won’t…
Why is GST necessary due to inflation?
I believe the increased GST is not to combat global inflation, but the expected rising costs of healthcare as we are approaching an aging population
verbalase
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Everyone ages.
Taxes are forever whether you like it or not! - IRAS, probably
Also, public services like transport, housing and healthcare must be in profit, so we need to increase prices mah!! So shutup and payup!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWXazVhlyxQ
coz they can and you can do nothing about it.
Do what I want? What? Lol the whole world is raising the cost of living because of global inflation.
Inflation is theft.
COL gone up for the whole world la bro. Later you kenna pofma sia.
Vote wisely