Financial investing : a rigged game?

• Main Author: Chong, Min Jian
• Other Authors: Zhan Shaohua
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2019
• Subjects: Social sciences::Sociology
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/78831
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Singapore is a renowned global financial hub, with financial investments forming a crucial part of Singaporeans’ daily lives. While perceived as a good way to earn some returns and potentially better one’s lifestyles, is the investing activity itself actually ‘rigged’ against those socioeconomically disadvantaged, thus reinforcing societal inequality? Drawing on qualitative interviews with eight middle class investors, this study seeks to uncover the similarities and differences in aspects within financial investing between different socioeconomic classes. From these, and tallied with past studies, it can be seen how the investment game in Singapore is inherently ‘rigged’ for the lower-middle class. Their lesser amounts of capital and socialized tendencies have shaped their investment attitudes and behaviours which left them with relatively disadvantaged investment outcomes. This contrasts against upper-middle class investors, whose higher amounts of possessed capital have positioned them for better investment outcomes through more advantageous investment tendencies and actions.