I’m 30 this year. Local uni grad, second-upper honors. Ever since I entered the workforce, I’ve been doing everything “right.” I regularly OT until 9 PM, take on extra projects, upskilled myself with certifications, and barely take medical leave. After five years of intense corporate grinding, I finally climbed my way up to an IT Manager role. My monthly basic is now decent, and I felt quite proud of myself. I thought, okay, hard work pays off.
Then there’s my colleague, “Marcus.” Same age, joined the company at the exact same time as a senior engineer. Performance-wise? He’s average at best. He does his bare minimum, hits the 5:30 PM dot and immediately zhaos (vanishes), and never volunteers for high-visibility firefighting tasks.
Last week during a team lunch, the topic of housing came up. I was sharing how stressed I am trying to save enough for a decent BTO downpayment while praying the resale market doesn’t completely explode before my wedding.
Marcus just casually chips in: “Oh, housing is damn stressful lah. Luckily my late grandfather bought a freehold 3-bedroom condo in District 10(AKA Bukit Timah) back in the 90s, passed it down to my parents, and they just legally transferred it to my name last year so I can stay near my workplace.”
Bro, my jaw literally dropped. He casually inherited a property worth easily $2.5 to $3 million. Entirely paid off.
It completely broke my reality. I went back to my desk and did the math. Even if I save $3,000 every single month religiously, it would take me over 80 years of pure working and saving just to match the asset value he started his adulthood with.
And because he has zero mortgage stress, his lifestyle is on a completely different level. He drives a nice continental car, goes on three-week holidays to Europe twice a year without caring about his bonus, and invests his entire salary into high-growth ETFs because he has zero downside risk. Meanwhile, I am counting pennies, tracking my cai fan prices, and checking my CPF Ordinary Account daily like it’s a lifeline.
The worst part? His absolute lack of financial stress makes him a better employee. Because he doesn’t care about getting fired, he speaks up confidently in meetings, pushes back against toxic management, and never looks desperate. The bosses actually respect him more for it, while I look like a stressed-out, desperate people-pleaser. He’s probably getting promoted before me.
I just feel so incredibly defeated. In Singapore, we are fed this meritocracy myth from primary school—study hard, get a good job, work tirelessly, and you will succeed. But the reality is that one single generational lottery ticket completely eclipses a lifetime of blood, sweat, and OT.
How do you guys cope with this absolute disparity without becoming completely bitter? Is the Singapore dream just a illusion for anyone born into a normal heartland family?