In the U.S. in general, the larger the population of a city, the higher are the municipal per-capita annual taxes.

Singapore is 1 city. so you might now have known that.

7) The rate (S) at which a society can improve the average standard of living of its people is directly related to the rate of application of new technologies (T) and is inversely related to the rate of growth (R) of the size of the population (the fractional increase per unit time), by a relation with the general properties of the equation,

S = T – A R + B

where A and B are positive constants.

A) In places in the world in 1998, the value of R (the rate of growth of population) is so large that it is causing S to be negative. Said in other words:

a) Population growth competes with and slows down the rate of improvement of the average standard of living and may cause the average standard of living to decline. In other words:

b) Population growth interferes with economic growth.

http://www.albartlett.org/articles/art_reflections_part_6.html

The first law of sustainability is :

First Law: Population growth and / or growth in the rates of consumption of resources cannot be sustained.

I suggest that you read about this. Because your logic is not logic. If we all make more babies, we already have 6.8 billion people, we will compete for food, and that’s not a good thing.

There is only so much food we can produce on the planet. The world stock pile of food have been in decline for the last 30 years. we destroys forest, we are warming the planet which create droughts and less food.

If your university agrees with population growth, they advocate unsustainability.

people cannot survive without food.

A) A population growth rate less than or equal to zero and declining rates of consumption of resources are a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition for a sustainable society.

B) Unsustainability will be the certain result of any program of “development,” that does not plan the achievement of zero (or a period of negative) growth of populations and of rates of consumption of resources. This is true even if the program is said to be “sustainable.”

C) The research and regulation programs of governmental agencies that are charged with protecting the environment and promoting “sustainability” are, in the long run, irrelevant, unless these programs address vigorously and quantitatively the concept of carrying capacities and unless the programs study in depth the demographic causes and consequences of environmental problems.

D) Societies, or sectors of a society, that depend on population growth or growth in their rates of consumption of resources, are unsustainable.

E) Persons who advocate population growth and / or growth in the rates of consumption of resources are advocating unsustainability.

F) Persons who suggest that sustainability can be achieved without stopping population growth are misleading themselves and others.

G) Persons whose actions directly or indirectly cause increases in population or in the rates of consumption of resources are moving society away from sustainability.

(Advertising your city or state as an ideal site in which to locate new factories, indicates a desire to increase the population of your city or state.)

H) The term “Sustainable Growth” is an oxymoron.

An early Merry Xmas to you!

You are right; there’s a free rider problem. But thinking about it, can we have a real life situation where there’s no free rider problem? Probably not.

In anycase, the government probably has enough money to burn such that the free rider issue isn’t one that’s too big. I think the bigger concern is PRs and new citizens flush with cash and coming in to spend them pretty indiscriminately compared to native Singaporeans, thus squeezing us.

I’m not quite sure if I answered you sufficiently, so please do follow up if I didn’t.

You will disagree, but I do think that a significant reason behind more liberal immigration policies is because we are not producing enough Singaporeans as ‘fuel’ for our economic engine. If our birth rates were not that low to begin with, there would be much more young, native adult Singaporeans and there will be a less compelling reason to bring in foreigners.

Besides, if we lack babies, it doesn’t make sense to just bring in babies. Who’s going to take care of them? Of course you want to bring in parents with lots of young kids.

Yet you seem to think bringing in a 35 year old technician or a 40 year old cleaner is a logical alternative to a lack of babies!!! Common sense would tell you that if we are short of babies, we need to import babies. We are certainly not short of 30-40 year olds!

The birth rate in Singapore in the 1960s and 1970s when those 30 and 40 year old “foreign talent” were born was one of the highest in the world! KKWCH had the world record for the highest number of babies born in one hospital in 1966.

The low birth rate has nothing to do with the “foreign talent” policy unless you are referring to the ethnic quotas.

Do not fall into the trap of mixing the two up