Is Singapore burning out? Unpacking the FIRE movement and its implications

Abstract

Amidst soaring costs of living and intensifying pressures of financial self-reliance in Singapore, the Financial Independence, Retire Early (FIRE) movement has emerged as a pragmatic response to these challenges. However, upon deeper inspection, the FIRE movement sits uneasily within the landscapes of financial subjectivities. Drawing on qualitative interviews with 15 young working adults actively pursuing FIRE, the study utilises a financial citizenship framework to interrogate how FIRE strategies—characterised by frugality, disciplined investing, and a rejection of conventional wage labour—simultaneously reinforce and undermine state-driven financial subjectivities. The findings reveal a paradox: while adherents rigorously embody state-promoted ideals of self-reliance and rationality, affirming the effectiveness of its neoliberal governmentality project, their actions may subvert and destabilise state developmental goals.