From Singapore Mind:
Minister Mah calls WP irresponsible for its plan to provide more affordable flats. He says that cheaper flats means more housing subsidies and less money for education and healthcare.
Let me ask you a simple question. In the past few years when the price of HDB flats surge by more than 50%, by Minister Mah’s logic, the govt should be awashed with more money from selling HDB flats for healthcare and education – if that is so, why did the govt implement means testing to cut subsidies for healthcare and why did they have to raise school fees for universities and cuts subsidies for education of children with special needs etc?
The fact is budget has little to do with HDB selling price. If anything, when the HDB prices go up, the HDB actually shows more losses due to “market subsidies” which increase proportionately with price. Why is this so?
When the price of flats surge up by 50%, no significant amounts of money went to subsidise healthcare and education. Similarly, if the price rise of flats is kept close to changes median incomes suggested by the WP, healthcare by pricing the land sales to HDB accordingly, healthcare and education will not be affected.
Read the full write-up on Singapore Mind.
