Singapore

Whether it’s replying to messages or checking emails, watching a series or a movie, or shopping online, screens now hold a central place in our daily lives. A new way of living that sometimes pushes us to neglect activities that were once essential, such as outdoor activities, social interactions, or books and reading. To address this phenomenon and encourage its citizens to detach from their phones, computers, or televisions, Singapore has designed a program that pays them for reading a book.

Money, an Incentive for Reading

Since the start of September 2026, the Singaporean government has launched a program aimed at paying its citizens who dedicate at least fifteen minutes per day to reading a book. The objective? To counter doomscrolling, the practice of endlessly scrolling through posts on social networks, sometimes for hours on end. The scheme also aims to protect young people from the anxiety-inducing content they can be exposed to on the Internet.

Singapore also hopes that this program will improve its citizens’ concentration, critical thinking, and imagination. The principle is simple: readers can accumulate points, later converted into cents. As The Guardian explains, 50 daily reading sessions on a government site are needed to earn 1 Singapore dollar. A session of 15 minutes or more indeed yields 20 virtual coins, while you must accumulate 1,000 to obtain one dollar. Only one reading session is allowed per day.

A program that thus requires a certain degree of diligence if one truly hopes to pad their wallet. “We live in a world of extraordinary abundance of content, information and stimuli. At any moment, we can scroll through hundreds of titles, watch a video, or get a summary. We know that habits are built through small, regular actions. That is why we start with a simple objective: read 15 minutes a day. On the bus, before bed, or during lunch”, stated Melissa Tam, the director of the National Library Board in the columns of the Straits Times.

Singapore Is Not New to Financial Incentives

The program, carried out by the National Library Board (NLB), an agency that administers Singapore’s public libraries and falls under the Ministry of Digital and Information Development, aims to reach 150,000 users by September 2027.

Despite the government’s concerns about reading, fifteen-year-old Singaporean students recently topped the global reading rankings as part of the 2025 Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), ahead of China and Taiwan.

As surprising as it may seem, Singapore is not new to using financial incentives to influence the behavior of its citizens. Indeed, the city-state had already employed this method to encourage Singaporeans to walk and meet their daily step goals in exchange for supermarket vouchers.