Philippine budget deficit outlook for 2010: shortfall not too bad?

In ABS-CBN's recent article, they reveal that each Filipino now owes P47,039 to local and foreign creditors, based on the national government's total debt stock as of September.

A month before that, each of the 92.2 million Filipinos owed P45,889. 

The culprit: the widening budget deficit that prompts the government to borrow some more. Additional debts, which address current funding needs but could be paid in the future, translate to more debt burden for future generations.

The fact that the Philippines has been spending more than it earns is not earthshaking. Even the richest of countries have budget gaps. But prudence dictates that this deficit, which is a fiscal policy issue, has to be manageable.  Read more... (850 words, 1 image, estimated 3:24 mins reading time)

Some charts : web

While everybody's eyes are on ISM, let's talk about WEB which no one else has anyway.  Just the other day I showed my friend what the chart of WEB looks like and I was telling him how it would hit the trendline soon.  Well, this chart is about a day or two old, and we've in fact hit this trendline.

Notice that everytime this trendline is hit, WEB appears to have diminished buyers and more sellers than usual before bouncing.  The breakout from last month's ascending triangle shows a 5 peso move from 15.75-16 which points to around 21 if this trendline bounce occurs next week.

I will stake longneck's life that it will.

How much do Philippine government officials make in salary?

For all the headaches a government official is embracing upon being elected into office, did you ever wonder how much they make in a month?  Why spend hundreds of millions for only a yearly salary not exceeding 1 million pesos for the top post of President of the archipelago?  

Does that mean they all steal?  Or all for the service of the country? Sense of nationalism? "Give something back to the country"?  And yet some senators are so pompous and arrogant at shouting at citizens in their blue ribbon inquiries, forgetting that they are there at the service of the Filipino people.  Anyway…….. here are their salaries as of 2001.  Read more... (973 words, estimated 3:54 mins reading time)

Teachers and government workers get payhike

Much publicized last week was the P6,500 pay hike for the teachers which was proposed and set to be heard by the House Chambers and signed by the President before it is finally enacted into law.

High-ranking bureaucrats such as undersecretaries, assistant secretaries and directors will get an increase of 100 percent of their basic pay, excluding allowances, he said.

Unlike teachers, he said these officials receive additional compensation in the form of fat allowances.

Padilla proposed that teachers who hold salary grade 10 under the 33-grade government compensation scheme should be adjusted to grade 15 with a monthly salary of P24,878.

Rodriguez, on the other hand, took up the cudgels for the more than 100,000 soldiers.  Read more... (246 words, estimated 59 secs reading time)

Why is the Philippines poor?

This businessmirror article by Zoilo Bingo Dejaresco actually answers the previous article's dilemma, or more like quagmire, on why the Philippines will take 175 years to catch up on other countries in terms of GDP.  This article here actually sums up the cause of our self inflicted poverty, which are the attitudes of crab mentality and corruption.

THE proud claim of Philippine Airlines of being Asia’s first airline is not an empty boast. For, after all, it was just a few decades ago when the Philippines was the second-biggest economic might after colossus Japan. What has happened since then?

Today, the Philippines is almost the basket case of Asia, with war-torn Vietnam eclipsing our growth rate, and we are now in the league of Bangladesh. It is a source of monumental sadness.  Read more... (865 words, estimated 3:28 mins reading time)

Philippines 175 years behind in terms of GDP

Most of us in touch with reality know how our country lags as compared to other previously third world countries when we see their infrastructure, political system, economic reaping, etc., but to actually get this figure of 175 years behind from the ADB. wow!

It would take nearly two centuries for the Philippines to catch up with the living standards of industrialized countries at its current pace of economic growth, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) reported Thursday.

In a study titled, “A Cross-Country Analysis of Achievements and Inequities in Economic Growth and Standards of Living,” the Manila-based lender said the results suggest a large disparity in living standards across countries, and the disparity in per capita income was far greater than that in the other indicators of living standards.  Read more... (766 words, estimated 3:04 mins reading time)

Philippines Raises Bank Deposits Insurance to 500,000

Philippine President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo signed into law Wednesday the amendments to the charter of the Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp. to raise the insurance coverage of bank deposits from 250,000 pesos (US$182,88) to 500,000 pesos (US$36,577).

President Arroyo said the amendments to the charter are part of reforms designed to increase protection of bank deposits and consequently increase the confidence of the public in the banking system.

In October last year, the president approved a proposal to increase the deposit insurance coverage of bank deposits to deter mass withdrawals by depositors amid the global financial crisis.

The original proposal was to increase the maximum deposit insurance coverage from 250,000 pesos to 1 million pesos (US$73,153 dollars), but the Congress trimmed the new maximum insurance coverage to 500,000 pesos.  Read more... (176 words, estimated 42 secs reading time)

Philippines budget deficit swells further

MANILA, April 22 (Reuters) – The Philippines budget deficit almost tripled in March from a year earlier as the government ramped up spending to overcome the global downturn that is squeezing revenues, officials said on Wednesday. Finance Secretary Margarito Teves told reporters customs revenues were lower last month on sluggish imports and tax collections from stock market transactions declined.

The fiscal shortfall for the first three months of the year reached 119.7 billion pesos (about $2.5 billion), nearly two-thirds of the government's full-year 2009 deficit estimate.  This is also more than double than the P51.6 billion ($1 billion) deficit posted in the same period last year — due to lower tax collection and higher government expenditures.  Read more... (629 words, estimated 2:31 mins reading time)

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