Lightening the Load: Why Singapore Needs to Measure Time

Singapore is rethinking how family policy can better support people in managing work and family life. At the National Day Rally on 23 August, Prime Minister Lawrence Wong outlined the first set of measures from the Marriage and Parenthood Reset workgroup, including more childcare leave, sustained financial support and more affordable preschool. He described the goal as a “fundamental shift” in how families are supported and began with “something every parent wishes they had more of: time.” If Singapore wants to understand and ultimately lighten that load, it needs to measure that resource more systematically. A regular, nationally representative time-use survey would provide an important evidence base for designing and evaluating family, care and work-life policies across the life course.

Signs of an uneven load

The need for such data is already visible in the evidence we do have. In the Marriage and Parenthood Survey 2021, married women reported spending about six hours on childcare on a normal weekday, compared with 3.6 hours for men. On weekends, the figures were 10 hours and 7.7 hours respectively. According to the Labour Force Survey 2025, 61.5 per cent of women aged 25 to 64 who were outside the labour force were not working or looking for work because of family responsibilities.

Researchers have also produced valuable evidence using smaller datasets. Zang et al. (2024) used a panel dataset of 290 married women interviewed before, during and after the COVID-19 lockdown to examine changes in time spent on paid work, housework and childcare. Studies like this demonstrate the value of time-use data. Yet targeted studies cannot substitute for a regular national statistical baseline that allows us to see how patterns change over time and across different groups.

What Singapore already measures

Singapore already collects rich data on many dimensions of family and economic life. The Labour Force Survey provides annual information on employment, labour force participation and hours worked, while the Household Expenditure Survey, conducted every five years, provides detailed information on household expenditure. The Government also collects periodic data through the Marriage and Parenthood Survey, conducted roughly every three to five years, which examines aspirations, attitudes and selected caregiving patterns related to marriage and parenthood.

There are also some existing sources of time-use evidence in Singapore. The Singapore Longitudinal Early Development Study, which began with a nationally representative sample of households with at least one child under the age of seven, includes detailed 24-hour diaries showing how young children spend their days and who they spend that time with. Wave 1 was conducted in 2018-2019, Wave 2 in 2021, and data collection for Wave 3 was completed in January 2026. However, these diaries focus on children’s time rather than providing a comprehensive account of how adults divide their day.

What Singapore still lacks is a regular, nationally representative picture of how adults allocate the full 24 hours across paid work, housework, childcare, eldercare, commuting, sleep, leisure and other activities competing for the same finite resource. This is the gap a national time-use survey could fill.

Seeing the full picture

Time-use data tell us not only how many hours people spend on a particular activity, but what they do, for how long and in what context: where they are, whom they are with and who benefits from the activity. This can show how paid work, housework, care and personal time fit together across the day. The new childcare leave measures announced at the National Day Rally make the need for such data even clearer. Time-use data could help policymakers assess how this protected time affects the division of childcare and housework, and whether mothers and fathers use it differently.

As Singapore ages, this becomes even more important. Care does not begin and end with young children. Adults may also be caring for ageing parents, and some will be managing both forms of care at the same time. Time-use data can be broken down by sex, age, employment status, household composition and income, allowing policymakers to see not only average patterns but which groups face the greatest time constraints. Time-use measurement is therefore not a niche statistical exercise. It is part of the infrastructure for better family, labour and social policy.

Other Asian countries show what is possible. Japan has conducted its Survey on Time Use and Leisure Activities every five years since 1976. Its 2021 survey covered about 91,000 households and 190,000 people, and the Statistics Bureau identifies work-life balance, population ageing, childcare and gender equality among the policy areas the data can inform. By 2021, more than 30 countries across Asia and the Pacific had undertaken some form of time-use data collection.

Where to start

For Singapore, a practical first step would be to pilot a time-use module that captures both paid and unpaid work and distinguishes between childcare, adult care and housework. The Government has already said that it will enhance the Marriage and Parenthood Survey in 2026 to gain deeper insights as part of the broader Marriage and Parenthood Reset. A time-use component could be tested in that context, although a longer-term, nationally representative series should extend beyond marriage and parenthood to capture care across later stages of life as well.

This is especially relevant now. Singapore’s resident fertility rate reached 0.87 in 2025, its lowest on record. At the Rally, PM Wong also acknowledged that the decision to have children is deeply personal and that policies alone cannot make it happen. The case for better time-use data should not rest on fertility alone. Family policy should also be judged by whether people can combine work and care without chronic time pressure, whether fathers are enabled to be equal caregivers, and whether women face fewer trade-offs between family responsibilities and economic participation.