Beside the money under your pillow or in your bank account(s) and the shares/REITs in your CDP account, as well as the physical properties in your real estate portfolio, the other equally important asset that we all should amass is the skill sets/knowledge. That's where SkillsFuture initiative came in to promote lifelong learning.
I have checked with a few of my close friends and understand that all of us (including myself :-)) have not really made use of our SkillsFuture Credits (SGD500) since the implementation in 2016. Have you utilized yours?
These are the free money from Government to help upgrade ourselves (be it for career or personal purposes) and I think we should make full use of it, as early as possible. Not only that, Government has up the offer recently by providing additional funding for many of the eligible courses/workshops/programmes i.e.:
Singaporeans and Singapore PRs are eligible for 70% course fee funding for registration with effect from 28 October 2017.
Singaporeans aged 40 and above will enjoy 90% subsidy of course fee.
These are substantial funding!
Just take an example from one of the Fintech programs that I am considering at the moment: Fintech Talent Program (an 80-hours joint program from NTUC, Singapore Polytechnic and Fintech Association), the original course fee vs subsidized course fees are as follow:
For me (obviously above 40), the after-subsidized fee is only $320 and I can make use of my SkillsFuture credits to cover this in full, so, it's a FREE course!
What the government trying to do is to remove/minimize the impact of one of the usual key considerations for us when talk about learning/upgrade i.e. the fee, the rest (like the time commitment) is up to us to juggle.
I do encourage all friends to make full use of your SkillsFuture and the related subsidies (ASAP) to upgrade yourselves as I do believed that such assets has compounding effect too. Besides, such funding program might not be here forever! :-)
Cheers!
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