Note: This is another old article I wrote when I was in uni to highlight how hiring low-income mothers in the childcare sector can address both employment challenges and manpower shortages. Originally published in The Straits Times Opinions, it was later recommended by my professor and SMU’s Vice Provost to share with ForwardSG, leading to a discussion with the Minister of Education.

As a small island state with no natural resources, our government must identify and leverage human assets to advance our nation. Yet, there remains a group of people whose potential remains untapped—they are our low-income mothers, who face unique difficulties when it comes to employment.

The government should create programmes to train low-income mothers as childcare workers because it will break poverty cycles and strengthen our childcare workforce.

Labour in the childcare sector is not able to support increasing demand due to high attrition rates (Grosse et al, 2020). Parents, especially mothers, also suffer due to the sector’s limited manpower.

Studies by Singapore Business Federation (2021) and AWARE (2017) indicate that childcare is essential to enable women to be productive workers: 3 in 5 working-age women want to stop working over caregiving responsibilities, and 78% are excluded from the labour force for the same reason.

Low-income mothers face additional barriers to attaining childcare support: a lack of financial aid and unreliable low-wage employment (Teo, 2016). A minimum of 56 working hours per month is needed for maximum financial support from the government (AWARE and Daughters of Tomorrow, 2018), but the lack of coordination with employers in supporting low-wage workers with flexible working arrangements makes it impossible (City of Good, 2022).

This forms a vicious cycle of unmet needs, where low-income women have to ensure that their children are taken care of before working, but unstable working hours simultaneously disqualify them for childcare assistance. Unable to secure a stable income, these women become constrained by poverty, and their children will likely inherit the struggle to acquire social mobility (Galiani, 2010).

To tackle this issue, the OECD (2018) has found that supporting parents’ involvement in the labour market and strengthening the parent-child bond can decrease the transmission of disadvantages to children. Since childcare centres open only at certain hours, the proposed solution will provide low-income women with the stability of a much more predictable working schedule than their current low-wage work. As a result, they can spend more on childcare and have more time and energy to nurture and invest in the growth of their children.

This will break poverty cycles because it will offer low-income children greater social mobility, which is “broadly defined as the ability of a child to have a better life than their parents” (Low, 2020). Currently, children of disadvantaged families are disadvantaged because their parents have fewer resources and skills to invest in their upbringing and education (Ho, 2007).

Training low-income mothers as childcare workers will also increase the productivity of the sector’s workforce because it will reduce the attrition rate by relieving the workload of current educators.

Teachers face strain in their dual job responsibilities: on top of planning curriculum and teaching, they also must take up administrative work and routine care for children (Goh & Low, 2022). Respondents from a study by Pek (2014) expressed the same frustrations and similarly “recommended extra staff to assist in routine care tasks”.

These tasks do not require formal education and training can be done on the job. Mothers from low-income backgrounds can be trained to help educators cope better.

The Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA) launched a similar program in 2011, where training requirements before employment were removed to increase the ease of joining the industry as paraeducators and paraeducarers. The more recent Progressive Wage Model, where low-wage employees are given a clear pathway for their wages to rise along with training, is also reminiscent of ECDA’s policy and the proposed solution.

Daughters of Tomorrow (DOT) also partnered with AWARE, J.P. Morgan and NTUC Health to successfully support low-income women with jobs in the fast-growing sector of eldercare (DOT, 2022).

These examples highlight the government’s existing resources and experience in executing programmes similar to the proposed solution. As such, the solution is viable for the government and has great potential to succeed.

In our current efforts to align ourselves to the principle of self-reliance, Singapore has made it necessary for low-income women to be employed to be eligible for help. But what if it is employment that they needed help with in the first place? Contrary to popular saying, it is not enough to teach a man to fish; fishing tools are also essential for him to continuously sustain himself. Similarly, the government needs to arm low-income mothers with employment in the fast-growing sector of childcare for our nation to envision a brighter and more resilient future.

References

Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE). (2017). Low-Income Mothers. Retrieved from https://www.aware.org.sg/research-advocacy/low-income-mothers/

AWARE and Daughters of Tomorrow. (2018). “Why are you not working?”: Low-income mothers explain challenges with work & care. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1080/0966369X.2015.1136810

City of Good. (2022). Issues in the Low-Income Space in Singapore: Key insights to guide your giving. Retrieved from https://cityofgood.sg/sector-insights/low-income-families/#

Daughters of Tomorrow (DOT). 2022. Eldercare Program. Retrieved from https://daughtersoftomorrow.org/get-support/eldercare-program/

Galliani, S. (2010). Social Mobility: What is it and why does it matter? Retrieved from https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/127621/1/cedlas-wp-101.pdf

Goh, C., Low, Y. (2022). The Big Read: The pre-school conundrum – why shortage of places persists in some estates despite millions invested. Channel News Asia. Retrieved from https://www.channelnewsasia.com/singapore/pre-school-childcare-shortage-places-estates-big-read-2786461

Grosse, S., Paulo, D. A. & Peh, Y. (2020). Why it’s still so hard to have more early childhood educators in Singapore. Retrieved from https://www.channelnewsasia.com/cnainsider/why-still-hard-get-early-childhood-educators-singapore-preschool-793946

Ho, K. W. (2007). Wage Inequality, Intergenerational Mobility and Education in Singapore. Retrieved from https://www.csc.gov.sg/articles/wage-inequality-intergenerational-mobility-and-education-in-singapore

Low, Y. (2020). Social mobility: Singapore tops Southeast Asia but ranks 20th overall in global study. Channel News Asia. Retrieved from https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/social-mobility-singapore-tops-southeast-asia-ranks-20th-overall-global-study#:~:text=Social mobility is broadly defned,on their success in life.

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). (2018). A Broken Social Elevator? How to Promote Social Mobility. Retrieved from https://www.oecd.org/social/soc/Social-mobility-2018-Overview-MainFindings.pdf

Pek. (2014). Factors impacting on childcare teacher retention in the Singaporean early childhood industry. Southern Cross University, School of Business. https://doi.org/10.25918/thesis.159

Singapore Business Federation. (2021). Uplifting Women in the Workforce: Investing in the Success of Women in Singapore. Retrieved from https://sustainable-employment.sbf.org.sg/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Uplifting-Women-in-the-Workforce-Investing-in-the-Success-of-Women-in-Singapore.pdf

Teo, Y. (2016). Not everyone has ‘maids’: class differentials in the elusive quest for work-life balance. Gender, Place & Culture. https://doi.org/10.1080/0966369X.2015.1136810