We beg to differ.
We take it for granted that material and accounts that provide priceless outsiders’ perspectives on the Philippines are so readily available for all to learn from but forget (1) how books are prohibitively expensive to most Filipinos and (2) how most Filipinos lack any inclination to read books to begin with. So it is worth…
Now that Philippine President Benigno Simeon ‘BS’ Aquino III is officially a lame duck president in the aftermath of a devastating Supreme Court ruling that rendered his financial brainchild, the notorious Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) unconstitutional, what can we expect him to “report” to Congress on his State of the Nation Address (SONA) this month?…
My views are not very popular with Filipinos. I guess it’s partly my fault because I like posting topics that some might consider taboo and boring. But it’s not like I discuss religion or make fun of other people’s religious beliefs. Granted, I like talking about Philippine politics and society in general but I really…
Read More “Filipinos need to end their love affair with mediocrity and ‘pwede na yan’ mentality” »
The Philippines with its population of 96 million registered a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $117 billion in 2006. Singapore for its part, with its relatively paltry population of 4.6 million delivered a GDP of $132 billion on the same year. For less than half a tenth of the humanity Filipinos apply to the job…
Read More “The Philippines vs Singapore: Jeepney vs Formula 1” »
The Philippines is imprisoned by a deep systemic inability in its people to extricate themselves from poverty. It is a problem that is an outcome of (1) the sheer number of Filipinos that inhabit the planet, (2) the average productive output of each warm Filipino body earning (or seeking to earn) a living, and (3)…
Read More “Philippine employment dilemma: Dumb down the jobs? Or smarten up the workforce?” »
Development in understanding in recent years is making real limits on growth a lot more palpable since it is becoming quite evident that our approach to measuring economic value and the costs of acquiring said “value” (i.e. our monetary system) is woefully incomplete. Yet economic growth remains the be-all-end-all that pervades every aspect of human…
According to Philippine Presidential Communications Operations Office head Herminio Coloma Jr., President Benigno Simeon “BS” Aquino won’t apologize for the controversial Disbursement Acceleration Program or DAP after it was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. He insists that “the executive branch ‘exercised good faith and due diligence’ in accordance with existing laws and relevant auditing…
The Philippines is a most massive outcome of lots of actions underpinned by very little thinking. So many initiatives, advocacies, “movements”, agendas, and vested interests driven by even more characters in a country of 100 million clueless people — it sounds like a chapter out of John Barrow’s book Impossibility. The Philippines is a case…
Read More “Achieving developmental focus: The Philippines’ Vital Few initiatives” »