Proceedings of the 2023 3rd International Conference on Social Development and Media Communication (SDMC 2023)

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The Impact of Digitalization on Income Inequality in Singapore

Authors
Lantian Christina Ma1, *
1United World College of South East Asia (Dover Campus), 139654, Singapore, Singapore
*Corresponding author. Email: christina201808@hotmail.com
Corresponding Author
Lantian Christina Ma
Available Online 30 December 2023.
DOI
10.2991/978-2-38476-178-4_19How to use a DOI?
Keywords
Income inequality; Singapore; Internet Access; Digitalization
Abstract

Digitalization has become one of the most significant trends experienced by the workforce. However, debates about whether it really benefits the population by offering them with more opportunities, or would exacerbate inequality because of Skill-Biased Technological Change (SBTC) that favours workers with digital literacy, has not yet been settled. This paper serves to investigate the correlation between digitalisation and income inequality (Gini coefficient) in Singapore. Linear regression analysis correlating Gini coefficient (representing income inequality) with percentage of household with internet access (representing individual use of the internet) showed a negative relationship between the two variables, suggesting more individual and household access to the internet helps alleviating income inequality in Singapore. In contrast, linear regression of Gini coefficient and percentage of businesses with broadband subscriptions (representing digitalization of businesses) found that an increase in digitalization within businesses would exacerbate income inequality due to SBTC. A special investigation into the effects on gender pay gap is undertaken, with similar trends obtained when it is correlated with the percentage of household with internet access and the percentage of businesses with broadband subscriptions, but the scales of such correlation are much smaller, possibly because of other social factors that also influence the wages of males and females.

Copyright
© 2023 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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Volume Title
Proceedings of the 2023 3rd International Conference on Social Development and Media Communication (SDMC 2023)
Series
Advances in Social Science, Education and Humanities Research
Publication Date
30 December 2023
ISBN
978-2-38476-178-4
ISSN
2352-5398
DOI
10.2991/978-2-38476-178-4_19How to use a DOI?
Copyright
© 2023 The Author(s)
Open Access
Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Cite this article

risenwbib
TY  - CONF
AU  - Lantian Christina Ma
PY  - 2023
DA  - 2023/12/30
TI  - The Impact of Digitalization on Income Inequality in Singapore
BT  - Proceedings of the 2023 3rd International Conference on Social Development and Media Communication (SDMC 2023)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 145
EP  - 154
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-178-4_19
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-178-4_19
ID  - Ma2023
ER  -