We need mechanisms to foster collaboration and co-creation ... … to translate ideas into products; bridge problems with solutions. People Let me start with the most critical part of ecosystem - people. The shortage of tech skills and talent is a global phenomenon. For a small city-state like Singapore, it is almost existential …. and that is why it is our top priority. Singapore is taking a multi-pronged approach: our institutes of higher learning are adapting their curriculum with industry input to develop students who are able to work with emerging technologies; our FIs are putting in place programmes to help re-skill mid-career professionals to take on the jobs of the future; and we will continue to welcome and embrace top talents from across the world to augment our own talent pool and raise the game here. Minister for Education, Ong Ye Kung, will speak more about skills and talent this Wednesday. Identity Let me then move on to the pain of verifying identity – the KYC problem. 3/9  BIS central bankers' speeches  For personal KYC, the Singapore government has taken the first step with National Digital Identity (NDI) … … which every resident of Singapore can use to establish his legal identity in a secure manner - with two-factor authentication and a public-private key pair - when making online transactions. A powerful component of NDI is MyInfo. This is a digital service that enables citizens to authorise third-parties to access their personal data sitting across many different government agencies.
In particular, we can’t be confident about how much fiscal drag will blunt growth. Ultimately, though, the drag should abate. When that happens – presumably later this year, the economy should strengthen. Inflation, as measured by the personal consumption expenditure deflator, is currently below the Federal Reserve’s 2 percent objective (Exhibit 9). Substantial slack remains in labor and product markets, and underlying measures of inflation are subdued. With weak labor compensation growth, the trend growth of unit labor costs is less than 1 percent annualized, which is well below price inflation. Moreover, inflation expectations remain well anchored at levels consistent with our 2 percent longer-run objective. Thus, I conclude that the risk that inflation could significantly exceed our 2 percent objective is quite low over the next few years, even if the recovery were to strengthen considerably. U.S. monetary policy initiatives Beginning in September, the FOMC made a number of important changes to monetary policy in order to promote a stronger recovery in the context of price stability. First, the FOMC began purchasing an additional $ billion of agency mortgage-backed securities (MBS) each month.4 Second, the FOMC stated, for the first time, that it would continue buying assets and employ its other policy tools as appropriate until there was a substantial improvement in the labor market outlook5. Third, the FOMC stated its intention to maintain a highly accommodative stance of monetary policy for a considerable time after the recovery strengthens. Two additional initiatives followed in December.