China's Economic Growth (WeiNing)

China has been developing their country rapidly in the recent years. It used to be one of the poorest countries i the world and it is now growing very quickly. China will continue to grow a develop their trading business, develop their infrastructure and many other projects as years pass. It will turn into a very prosperous country and one of the leading countries soon as well. Due to China's low coporate tax, which is 25%, they attract foreign investors to the country to do business. This allows China to be more developed with foreign investors. Also, China's low exchange rate will attract more tourists and foreigners to visit China. China's goods are mass produced and due to their cheap labour, the goods sold are thus cheaper in price as well.

However, the increase in income inequality in China will result in the country being richer but yet the people in China are becoming poorer and poorer. The rich gets richer, the poor gets poorer. In China itself, there will be more employment opportunities as more workers will be needed should more factories be built by foreign investors. But as more factories are being built, more pollution will be caused especially air pollution. One god example is the city of Beijing, the air pollution in Beijing is so bad that there's no one day with clear blue skies.

With China's rapid economic growth over the years, many countries start to trade with China, including Singapore. Our country should maintain on friendly terms with China so as continue trading with them. Without the trade from China, our country may not be able to survive on our own due to our lack of natural resources.

1 Child Policy (Keefe)

During our last CID lesson, we discussed about China's one child policy. China's one child policy states that in China every family can only be entitled to a child, but if it's a girl, the family can have another child. This policy was first implemented to limit China's population growth. But in Singapore's case, Singapore is suffering from a depletion in our birth rates. Which means that Singapore's manpower is decreasing, and Singapore has realized that this is becoming a problem as more foreigners are coming to Singapore. In my opinion, Singapore is getting invaded by foreigners and this is because of the low birth rate. But Singapore has been implementing new bonuses to encourage more births, I think this implementation is a good one because money is quite important in society and Singaporeans would be attracted. Singapore is definitely doing a good job of encouraging new births and I hope the plan continues on successfully.

1 Child Policy (WeiNing)

From the last cid lesson, we were introduced to China's one-child policy. This policy states that each pair of married couple is only allowed to give birth to one child, if the first child is a girl, they are then allowed to have another child. However, if the second child is also a girl, they are not allowed to give birth to anyore children. This policy may be useful in China's case as it sucessfully helped the country to decrease in population. However, i find that such a policy will not be sucessful in Singapore. With Singapore's declining fetility rate, the population rate of Singaporeans are declining as well. Thus, since we are declining in Singapore's population, the amount of manpower is decreasing too which results in the increasing number of foreign workers in Singapore. Many couples have only one or two children and some do not even wish to give birth at all. It is really worrying as the child needs to take up a lot of responsibility as the only child to support his/her parents. Thus, Singapore should encourage Singaporean women to give birth so as to increase the birth rate in Singapore to build a better nation with more young talents to aid in society. 

1 Child Policy (YueSan)

Singapore does not enforce the one child policy, in contrast, encourages a larger family. However, Singapore will be soon facing a "silver tsunami" if the birth rates do not pick up. Firstly, many young couples do not wish to have children when they are younger, but by the time they wish to do so, the natural fertility of the body goes down and they fail to conceive. Secondly, the life expectancy of humans has been prolonged by advancements in medicine, but this means that more elderly last longer, and their children have to support them, causing a burden to them.  Lastly, there are more singles nowadays who simply do not wish to marry or have children at all, exacerbating the problem.

One child policy (Isaac)

From our last cid lesson,we talked about China's one child policy(terms and conditions apply).Mainly it's about the Chinese government wanting to cut down on China's booming population,by restricting each family to only have one child. We learnt that methods on restricting more children includes going for frequent checkup set in place by the government, I feel that it is kind of taking away their privacy and anyway abortion babies deprive this new life of ever living one which is just plain sad. Having one child also put the burden on that one child to support the whole family. Coming back to Singapore,we are actually facing the opposite problem. Our government is encouraging child birth and setting up schemes which can help families with babies in many different ways,because Singapore is facing a decreasing amount of babies. Another way our government is solving this is by letting in more so called foreign talents,but this will end up with Singapore being a country of foreign talents. Like everything else the government do,maybe they should teach us about having more babies and solving this population problem from young, both countries should maybe learn from each other and help solve each other's problem.

1 Child Policy (YinnYi)

I know that Singapore has been encouraging people to give birth as the fertility rate of Sinagporeans have decreased. Now, singapore even has the baby bonus project, which encourages singaporeans to give birth to more children. I read in the newspapers that elderly makes up more than half of our population today, and its 2 elderly to one adult. if it continues like this, adults will feel very stressed, because they will have to have a child to take care of, as well as two elderly. moreover, they have to take care of the child's well being as well as juggle between work too. Having a child may not be a good thing too, as it may make the adult too busy, and may not bring up the child well. Gving birth is one's personal choice, and the government could not do anything other than encourage it. 

-YY 

Holidays + Reflection on poverty (Keefe)

There were 2 major events of my December holidays, the class outing and my multiple facilitator trainings. 

Firstly,

The class outing was really enjoyable although we all got sunburnt but it was a small price to pay for the strengthened bonds and the fun we had. We also lost a frisbee and a soccer ball, unfortunately, it could not be retrieved but the fun we had with them was worth it. This class outing was really successful and i think we should have more of these and if more of us were to be able to make it, each of us would have to spend lesser and it would be more fun!!!!

Secondly,

The facilitator trainings I went through was truly a very valuable experience and the bonds that we made during the trainings are really priceless and how much I appreciate the new friends I made there is really hard to describe using words. We all shared a common goal of making Orientation 2015 a successful one and we all went through the thick and thins of the trainings and the actual thing together just to achieve one goal. I really learnt a lot from the people there and during the actual Orientation, we all realized we were somewhat ready but we were not the best we could be, yet everyone continued trying their best and I really appreciate the other facilitators who went through the trainings with me. The result was obvious :)

Reflection on poverty

Poverty to me is when someone lacks daily needs and has to survive without basic needs like 3 meals a day or showers to keep oneself clean, in a general term, general scarcity.

There is not as much poverty in Singapore as compared to other countries mainly because Singapore does not have too big of population and living in Singapore is not too costly so most people can afford living in Singapore. But poverty is still present in Singapore although it is not common.I believe that life is not fair and that is why some people have to suffer and some of us live a luxurious life, and that we, the people who live comfortably should learn to lend a helping hand when we can and help the people in need. These people might be innocent and were born into a poor family so they did nothing wrong to be suffering and yet some people who do bad things can live luxuriously and that just shows how unfair life can be. So we should always help out people in need whenever we can because I think this is what we should do and what we could do the least is to give them some money and not leave them in the lurch to fend for themselves.