THE BIG PICTURE
The problem of over-relying on manual labour
Singapore has a foreign workforce of around 999,000 foreign workers offering manual, repetitive labor for many of their critical operational functions.
Most of these functions are repetitive, routine, ordinary or monotonous (such as clearing our garbage, sweeping the floors, or construction). Singapore, till today, struggles to reduce their dependence on foreign labor to complete these tasks.
On a broader scale, our foreign worker dependence is a simplification of the larger problem at scale. Businesses continue to rely on human resources to fulfill much of their operational needs, when modern automation tools and technology is available to handle these operations.