Singapore Grads Battle Low-Paid Traineeships Stigma to Get Hired

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(Bloomberg) — As the class of 2026 join the race to find jobs, unemployed college graduates in Singapore are taking a last-ditch shot at getting ahead: temporary government-funded gigs that earn them half the median first paycheck.

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The government’s Graduate Industry Traineeships, known as GRIT, offer a stopgap for graduates to gain industry-relevant experience with government agencies or private businesses, earning between S$1,800 to S$2,400 ($1,400 to $1,850) per month. The lowest end of that range is less than half the median graduate’s starting salary and around two-thirds the wage of a McDonald’s Corp. management trainee, who needs only a pre-university diploma.

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“When I started the program, I thought: ‘Shucks. I’ve finished four years of school and all I’ve got is a job that pays half of what my friends get’,” said Lee Jia En, a 25-year-old graduate from the Singapore University of Social Sciences. “But I felt it was worth it if it could help me get to my next job. So I said OK, let’s eat humble pie.” 

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Governments around the world have been laboring to prop up a sagging graduate jobs market amid a surge in artificial-intelligence adoption, a post-pandemic slowdown in hiring and lingering economic impacts from the Iran war. 

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Those headwinds run especially strong in trade-dependent, energy-importing Singapore. “Heightened uncertainty” has made businesses in the city-state more cautious about hiring, Manpower Minister Tan See Leng said in May. Prime Minister Lawrence Wong has warned that some existing jobs “will disappear” because of AI.

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Phang Jun, a 24-year-old communications major who graduated last year from Singapore Management University, felt her college degree was “useless” after applying for 100 jobs and receiving three low-paid offers outside her sector.

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She’s not the only one in that bind. Full-time employment rates among business, arts and science graduates from all six of Singapore’s universities fell about 10 percentage points between 2023 and 2025, the country’s latest annual graduate employment survey published in March shows. 

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Against that backdrop, the Ministry of Manpower launched the traineeships, echoing a similar program rolled out during the Covid-19 pandemic. Around 70% of each trainee’s fixed compensation range is funded by the Singaporean government, while employers foot the rest. 

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That has provided a key incentive to businesses to take on trainees in an otherwise challenging hiring environment, said participating companies surveyed by Bloomberg News. Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp Ltd has hired 40 trainees in areas including data and credit analysis after offering 50 places on the scheme, said Lee Hwee Boon, head of the bank’s human resources. 

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But job-seekers haven’t seized on the plan as expected. Applications fell about 90% between the program’s launch in October and February, with over half of 800 roles filled by March, Tan has said. The minister credited the softening uptake to applicants declining placements in favor of other job opportunities.