economic growth

Economic slowdown stresses urgency of boosting household purchasing power with wage hikes, ayuda– IBON

May 14, 2023

The continuing deceleration in household spending from low incomes and high prices is among the biggest factors in the slowdown, and is among issues that the administration can immediately address

Filipino workers productivity increasing but real wages falling — IBON

May 8, 2023

The gains from growing productivity are not going to workers as higher wages but to the profits of corporations and the wealth of the super-rich. Giving workers their fair share through decent wages will uplift their lives and also spur economic progress.

Filipinos didn’t feel growth because of ayuda cuts and stingy wage hikes – IBON

January 27, 2023

Millions of ordinary Filipinos did not benefit from supposedly rapid 2022 growth because the government tightened the purse strings on urgent cash assistance and only gave a negligible wage hike last year.

Rapid 2022 growth just a flash in the pan, poverty even increased — IBON

January 27, 2023

Relatively rapid growth in 2022 is only a rebound after the protracted pandemic lockdowns and there will be a steep slowdown this year.

Bongbong will be tested on the economy in 2023

January 21, 2023

The binding constraint to steadier progress and development is the outdated faith in market forces. The blindness to the state’s responsibility to intervene will mean worse times in 2023. It will also reopen lockdown wounds that were hidden by last year’s rebound but haven’t really healed yet.

Gov’t growth hype hides worsening situation of ordinary Filipinos — IBON

November 23, 2022

The finance secretary’s recent trumpeting of rapid growth is hype, and in reality the economy and the conditions of ordinary Filipinos have barely even returned to pre-pandemic levels.

Recovery stalls with Q2 GDP quarter-to-quarter contraction — IBON

August 11, 2022

Contrary to the new economic team’s hype, research group IBON said that the quarter-on-quarter contraction of the economy in the second quarter of 2022 shows that recovery remains weak and requires more determined government action. IBON said that reopening the economy is not enough because too many Filipinos are still jobless, earn too little, and […]

No Mavericks Among Economic Top Guns

June 15, 2022

The next administration’s economic agenda will be fully presented at the state of the nation address in July. There are hardly any specifics yet. Still, the tidbits already emerging can be interpreted against the incoming economic team members’ individual track record and especially in the context of the long arc of neoliberal thinking that has defined Philippine policymaking over the last half century.

PH among worst performers in Southeast Asia

June 13, 2022

The government hypes the Duterte legacy but comparing growth, jobs, inflation, trade and debt figures with other Southeast Asian countries shows the Philippine economy as among the poorest performers. This is due not only to its poor COVID response, harsh lockdowns and refusal of economic stimulus but to pre-pandemic mispriorities.