Author name: Mareng Winnie Monsod

Economist. Teacher. Writer. TV Personality.

So What’s This New Think Tank Really For

governance /

A lot of hoopla there was, about Congress needing its own national-level think tank; about academic research and published work not finding its way into legislation (this from the first-person experience of Cong. Quimbo – a staunch defender of the Maharlika Investment Fund)

If the CPBRD, the present think tank of Congress, is so inadequate as to need the help of 25 “Congressional Research Fellows”, whose fault is it? It is under the Office of the Speaker, after all.

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More of the Lies: What they’re saying about the OECD FDI Restrictiveness Index

data, fact check, governance, history /

Look more closely at the OECD FDI Index, (that people cite as evidence to change the Constitution). You would see that CHINA, which from the inception of the Index up to 2015, was ranked the most restrictive country in the OECD sample, was at the same time was also the largest recipient of FDI among the developing countries of the world. It still is, even though in 2015 the title of most restrictive passed on to the Philippines. Shortly thereafter, the Philippines the ninth, and the seventh top country of investment choice in a survey conducted by UNCTAD.

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Tell A Lie Often Enough, It Becomes The Truth

fact check, history, justice /

A colleague, Gerardo Sicat, asserts that the progress of “Tiger Economies” of East Asia-South Korea, Taiwan, Hongkong and Singapore – was “fueled by the heavy participation of foreign capital”. I refer him to the table on FDI, 1970-2021 which Sonny Africa presented to the Congressional Committee on Constitutional Amendments at the hearing on Thursday, where we were all present. the data show that FDI flows into Taiwan and South Korea were on the whole less, both in absolute terms and in percent of GDP, than FDI flows into the Philippines. In other words, there was no “heavy participation of foreign capital” that Gerry Sicat describes.

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Management by Illusion

1 Comment / crunching numbers, data, governance /

DA through the Food Terminal, buying onions at P140 million pesos of onions at P537 per kg. and selling them through the Kadiwa at P170, thus losing about P96 million. Whose brilliant idea was that? Selling at P170 was clearly to create the impression that Filipinos were now paying only that amount for onions, or the Kadiwa was doing a great job. “Management by illusion” is how the late Rafael Salas described the management style of PBBM’s father. Is this also true of the son?

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Faster Than a Speeding Bullet

crunching numbers, data, governance, justice /

Our Criminal Justice, according to the 2022 World Justice Project’s Rule of Law Index, has the lowest score among 8 factors that comprise the Index. We were given a score of 0.32 (0 is the lowest, showing weakest adherence to the rule of law, and 1 is the highest score showing strongest adherence). For context, the global average is 0.47 and the regional average, i.e. East Asia and the Pacific, is 0.53. That’s how bad our system is.

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Onions and the DA

crunching numbers, data, governance /

Did you know, for example, Reader, that a 1997 study showed that the Philippines has a comparative advantage in onions? That means, essentially, that we should be a net exporter of onions. Did you know that a summary of a one-hectare average cost and returns of onions in 2019 shows that the net returns per hectare is P237, 681 (compare that to rice, where the 2021 net return per cropping season is P19,593 ) ? That the net profit-cost ratio is 2.15, which means that the ROI (return on investment) is 215%?

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Who Wants the Maharlika Wealth Fund?

6 Comments / data, governance /

Now, all of sudden, the above four economic managers have issued a statement in favor of the bill, urging its immediate enactment, all warm and fuzzy and grateful to the legislature and the President.
I’m not buying it, Reader. It is written in such a brown-nosing manner that screams that the author is a paid hack of the Speaker and his congressional associates.

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The FEM Regime in Facts and Figures

1 Comment / data, fact check, history /

The Filipino’s average income (measured as GDP per capita) in 1985 was less than what it was 12 years before (1973). All the growth during the Martial Law period was washed out, with Juan and Juana de la Cruz holding a much-depleted income bag. And it would take the Philippines until 2002 to regain the real per capita income levels it was enjoying before the collapse.
(Good grief.Golden years?)

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