\n<\/p>\n
In that light, economists pointed out that the strongest-performing sectors in recent quarters are not labour intensive, while the weaker sectors are.<\/p>\n
Mr Goh said retail, hospitality and non-financial services make up 24 per cent of the economy, but employ around half of the workforce.<\/p>\n
\u201cHence, the feeling on the ground that the strong headline GDP growth is not benefitting workers, especially with disruptions to the labour market caused by AI which is forcing businesses to restructure to stay relevant,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
For now, Mr Lee said the overall labour market remains relatively resilient, so he remains watchful rather than overly concerned about the weaker sectors.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe divergence becomes more of a concern if weakness in consumer facing sectors starts feeding into employment and wages, because these sectors are more labour intensive than some of the industries driving GDP growth,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Standard Chartered economists Edward Lee and Jonathan Koh said they would be cautious about applying the \u201cbroad label\u201d of K-shaped growth on Singapore, instead describing it as “strong but relatively narrow and uneven”.<\/p>\n
They also said households experience economic conditions mainly through job security, wages and purchasing power \u2013 rather than the aggregate GDP number, pointing to a distinction between output growth and employment growth.<\/p>\n
\u201cStrong trade-related GDP growth has yet to generate commensurate employment gains, suggesting that the external-sector upturn has so far been relatively job-light,\u201d they said.<\/p>\n
If left unchecked, uneven economic growth could lead to a \u201cdual economy\u201d, said Dr Tan Ern Ser, adjunct principal research fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies.<\/p>\n
That means the economy would be split into two segments, one comprising knowledge workers who benefit from technological advancement and rising productivity, and one comprising low-skilled workers who face weaker wage growth and the threat of displacement.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe two segments are separated by a gap, with low opportunities for movement from the disadvantaged to the advantaged segment,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Over time, income differences can lead to wealth inequality, especially if the segment aided by AI continues to flourish while the other segment experiences low wages or job loss.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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WHY GROWTH IS FELT UNEVENLY ON THE GROUND In that light, economists pointed out that the strongest-performing sectors in recent quarters are not labour intensive,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":79828,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/dam.mediacorp.sg\/image\/upload\/s--HJPnzWoT--\/c_fill,g_auto,h_676,w_1200\/f_auto,q_auto\/v1\/mediacorp\/cna\/image\/2026\/08\/26\/ice_cream_food_and_beverage.jpg?itok=e4MUszMI","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2244,1239,9679,3538,209,4041],"class_list":["post-79827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-buzz-news-sg-global","tag-arent","tag-economy","tag-feeling","tag-growing","tag-singapores","tag-workers","wpcat-2-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=79827"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79827\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/79828"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=79827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=79827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=79827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}