Singapore government raises retirement and re-employment age again

SINGAPORE: The Singapore government announced that from July 1, 2026, the required retirement age will be raised from 63 to 64, and that the upper limit for re-employment will also change from 68 to 69. 

As reported by Yan.sg, the government had already set a goal to gradually raise the retirement age to 65 and the re-employment age to 70 by the year 2030 prior to this. This current adjustment is just the second step, commencing after the 2022 adjustment, in which the retirement ages were from 62 to 63 and 67 to 68, respectively. 

With this, the employment rate of older employees will continue to rise. According to data, after the re-employment age limit was raised to 68 in 2022, the employment rate of older employees increased significantly, and the employment rate of those directly affected by the postponement of the retirement age from 62 to 63 increased by 0.4%. Furthermore, the employment rate of people ages 65-69 reached 49.1%—0.7% higher than before the adjustment. 

The government stated that this ‘gradual delay’ of adjustments is effective, and is being slowly accepted by the members of the public. 

Why are the adjustments needed? 

One of the reasons why the adjustment of the retirement ages is needed is that more and more older people want to continue working. Research shows that the percentage of people aged 55 to 64 who are still working increased from 66.8% in 2018 to 70% in 2023.  

Furthermore, unions are also supportive of this, stating that older employees who still work can have a few more years to accumulate their retirement savings. The government is also paving the way for businesses and encouraging companies to offer part-time or flexible working options to older employees. Last year, more than 6,300 employers had agreed to provide such positions, and an estimated number of 50,000 older employees will benefit from it. More so, companies can receive an allowance of $2,500, up to a maximum of S$125,000, for every local employee aged 60 or above hired part-time. 

Additionally, the government has a ‘senior employee employment subsidy’ for companies. In 2025, a total of 90,000 companies received a total of 315 million in subsidies because they hired more than 400,000 senior employees.

The Singapore National Employers Federation admitted that by slowly raising the age limit, employers will have the time to adapt and plan for their next courses of action as they hire ‘older’ employees. The government also declared that it will continue to monitor the effectiveness of the policy implementation and welcomes suggestions from the citizens. 

Other related news 

In similar news related to new policies, Singapore’s Culture Pass will now unlock its new uses. People can now purchase literary works that were created by Singaporean citizens or permanent residents in the Chinese, English, Malay, and Tamil languages in several bookstores. 

Read more about the news article here.