Overview
- Prime Minister Lawrence Wong told a Forbes conference that the state will protect every worker rather than every job and ensure AI’s benefits are shared widely through reskilling and fair retrenchment rules.
- The government will rely on its tripartite model of government, employers and unions to run transformation grants, require employer-led retraining when firms get support, and make layoffs a last resort.
- Wong credited strong global demand for AI chips with lifting Singapore’s outlook and said semiconductor exports and related logistics and services helped revise GDP forecasts upward.
- He warned the current global AI and tech rally will eventually face a market correction and urged using the present window to build durable capabilities and attract long-term investment.
- Wong called for international rules for frontier AI, welcomed foreign task forces, and said Singapore will pursue phased, sector-by-sector regulation such as testing and gradual rollout of autonomous vehicles.