Foolish. That’s what this whole proposal by the NEDA Chief Recto is:
STO. TOMAS, Pangasinan, Philippines – President Arroyo has ordered economic managers to study the proposal of Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ralph Recto for the government to set up a fund to extend temporary unemployment insurance to workers who lose their jobs, with money to be provided by the Social Security System (SSS) and the national government.
Recto proposed during the Cabinet meeting that P5,000 or P10,000 be given monthly for six months to SSS members who lose their jobs due to the economic crisis.
I’m sure people will find ways to game that dole out so it doesn’t actually find its way to the poor starving masses.
This country already has an informal welfare system called the OFW. It is a mechanism by which Filipinos working abroad pay for their relatives studies, expenses in the Philippines. This country doesn’t need to institutionalize a welfare state further.
What does the government need to spend money on? It needs to reaffirm hard work. It needs to reward hardworking Filipinos in Government and in the Private Sector. How can government do this?
Through the tried and tested formula of spending on better infrastructure projects. Build more and better roads. It needs to build up telecommunication infrastructure, it needs to rapidly expand trains and whatnut. So get a government network up and running. Buy IT, buy a network infrastructure that will in turn get Globe, Smart and myriad Information Technology companies a contract with the government, which in turn feeds more people.
Create jobs and jobs mean money for people to actually buy more goods and services. This economy needs to circulate money. It needs to grow and thrive in the Philippines and not wind up going abroad to gather dust and interest. It is the classic multiplier effect that real jobs in the private sector mean more money for government.
Instead of providing six months to SSS members, increase pay for existing government health workers. Buy more medical equipment for hospitals (which in turn fuels the local medical equipment business). Better government hospitals mean increase in competition for Privately run hospitals who in turn will have to respond appropriately. So funnel money into those institutions government already have. In turn, those people will spend more on their loved ones. They’ll buy more with greater purchasing power, and hospitals get to save more lives.
Give police better pay. Whether they spend that money on their real wives or their mistresses doesn’t matter, right? the fact that they’ve got money to spend means it goes to Jollibee, it goes to Smart and Globe and to National Bookstore for kids come June 2009. Also buy police real gear— communications and fuel and real training and I’m sure the local ammunitions industry will benefit as much as the local oil industry.
We need better schools and better teachers and better gear for government. Government needs to buy more teacher training, and find more efficient ways to spread education. The kind of education that makes people think, and not just the ability to give out facts and figures that anybody with a brain can google.
Government needs to spend money where it can count and not waste its time on dole-outs.
The Philippines needs to keep the wealth it gets and circulates it in the broader economy. Jobs and Infrastructure are classic tools of government. Government needs to spend what little money it has and make it count. Make this wealth grow and thrive. That’s the best way to endear yourselves to people’s hearts and not to artificially buy their votes. Because in the end, the consummate politician will talk dole-outs masking as a bleeding-heart for the poor while missing the broader picture that actually changes lives. That would be the difference between a statesman and a politician, I guess.
thanks to Rom and Marck for the heads up on the news article.
Popularity: 1% [?]
More than creating jobs — which could be anything, including sweeping streets we the citizens should be keeping clean anyway — the money we give government, since we are doing it anyway, should be geared towards helping citizens make stuff, that is, produce. Real stuff like vegetables or windmills and solar cells and t-shirts and doodads for cellular phones. Anything that people would want to buy.
From what I understand of those “P5,000 and P10,000″ proposed by Recto is sort of an “advance”, to be deducted from the SSS pensions of those who avail of the advance when they retire. Baka may interest pa, heheh.
If true, then this is not dole out but just photo-ops and pa-pogi for the coming election.
To keep wealth within the domestic economy means moving away from high-import-input exports, labour-added-value industries, manufacturing of non-durables, consumption, and OFW remittances as a means of making a living.
As Jeg say, things that people want to buy needs to be produced with a high component of domestic design, capital, and raw material input.
This is what the bogus value that lay masked by perceived prosperity is made of — “value” created by money changing hands and goods being shipped from one place to another without a proportionate value of it accounted for by production.
Farming is still what the Philippines needs to cultivate once again. Ang mga magsasaka natin hindi na nagtatanim dahil wala na silang kinikita sa kanilang sinasaka gawa ng mga tinatawag na MIDDLEMAN. Ang middleman pupunta sa bundok or sa bukid para bilhin sa pagkamurang halaga ang kanila sinasaka at ibebenta nila ng mahal at ibebenta naman nung bumili sa mga consumers ng pagkamahal na din..ibig sabihin kumita na ang lahat bukod sa mga magsasaka at talo pa ang mga bumibili.
Noong naninirahan pa ako sa pinas, meron kaming kasambahay na ang pamilya nya at nagsasaka ng palay, noong una, umuutang sila sa 5-6 para makabili ng binhi…sa dahilan na binibili ng middleman ang kanilang ani ng pagkababa at magbabayad pa sila sa 5-6, lumalabas na wala na silang kinikita, pati pagkain nila inuutang na din. Sa dahilan na gusto kong makatulong, ako na ang nagpautang sa kanya ng pambili ng binhi..walang interes at pinautang ko din sya ng para sa kakainin ng kanyang pamilya para di na sila umutang doon..wala din interest..lumalabas na kada katapusan ng ani, matapos mabenta ang kanilang palay, nababayaran nya ang perang inutang nya sa akin at meron pa akong libreng isang sakong bigas…ibig sabihin kumikita na sila at nagkaroon pà sila ng pera pambili ng binhi sa para sa susunod na taniman.
Ang gobyerno ay matagal ng hindi pinapansin ang hinaing ng ating magsasaka…tangalin ang middleman..gumawa ng maayos na daan at maglagay ng transportation para sa mga magsasaka para maibaba nila sa bayan ang kanilang producto, o di kaya dapat ang buyer mismo ang pupunta sa kanila para bilhin ang kanilang producto…sa ganitong paraan masaya ang lahat, pati ang mamimili.
Pero ang gobyerno natin ay bulok, dahil nga puro bulok yung mga nanunungkulan..
what’s wrong with the proposal?
we got unemployment benefit here in the States which is also good for six months.
only those who were terminated are eligible for the benefits. Verification of the cause of the termination is the first thing that the Employment development agency does.
Recipients of the benefits are required to report that they are applying for a job.
We paid for the premium and so does our employer. most of the time, because termination never happens, the insurance does not apply.
if the payment to the unemployed in the Philippines is to be deducted from their death benefits or pensions, so much the better because the member is going to enjoy the benefits while he is still alive and the value of the money is still high.
How much can you buy for a pension that you will get 10 years from now?
as to the interest, know the difference between a loan and a beneift.
Okay to set up a new fund. NOT OKAY to touch the SSS or GSIS money to pay unemployment benefits.
The business-model of practically all social security plans is to pay the retirement benefits of those already retired from the recently-collected funds.
In other words, the money into SSS/GSIS “collected” from last-year and this year’s workers are NOT intended for these 50-years-or-younger workers (The recently-collected money is intended for those who were working 10 or more years ago).
If the SSS and GSIS want to offer unemployment benefit then let them do a small program first. Then incorporate the benefit (with additional contribution from members) if the initial program is successful.
On reducing the unemployed. Loitering should be prohibited. Unemployed people should stay in their homes if they don’t want to look for a job.
Filipinos are survivors. They are strong, resilient
people. It is time to help those out of job, until
they can get back to another job.
Instead of giving pay to those Parasites working
as Political Leaders.
It is white propaganda, what else is it with Recto the willing poster boy?
Just get the P10k but don’t trade it off with GMA endorsed candidates.
Don’t give PNP a better pay. It should soon be abolished for it has outlived its usefulness. They are a bunch of ignoramuses according to Erap.
karlpopper,
there will be no GMA endorsed candidates…malapit ng makuha ng mga lintek na congresista ang kelangang boto para sa CON-ASS, sa pangunguna syempre ng beloved na mga anak na ating reyna bwihihihihi….GMA pa din ang pangulo natin sa susunod na ewan ko….
bahala na si batman…
kape tayo sa dunkin :)
For some hints on how to talk to Filipino voters come 2010, check this one out:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20090325/sc_livescience/whytoddlersdontdowhattheyretold
there is no way to talk to Filipino voters and persuade them to vote with conscience, there’s just no way….
magtiis na lang tayo…bwihihihihi
“Government needs to spend money where it can count and not waste its time on dole-outs.”
I dunno, Cocoy. I think you’ve got things mixed up.
What NEDA Secretary Recto is proposing is for SSS to provide unemployment benefits of 5,000 to 10,000 for six months to laid-off SSS members. Not a member, no unemployment.
The infra spending you are suggesting should come form the government stimulus package.
In a sense, the SSS temporary unemployment benefits create some additional stimuli as these laid-off employees continue to have some disposable income for half a year.
Please remember SSS is not government, it is government administered with a board of trustees composed of representatives from employees (trade unions), employers (Confederation of Employers), etc.
Although past actions by administrations seem give that signal.
Phil Manila, point well taken.
Actually given this country’s shape, and given the challenges facing this country tomorrow, it isn’t suppose to be a “stimulus package” of any sort but exactly what they should be doing to grow this nation. my point being, it isn’t an extraordinary measure but that’s what we should be doing as a nation.
Exactly. Also, I find it useless too, if I may add, but that’s my personal bias.
Stimulus package in America. Stimulus package in the Philippines.
Unemployment in America. Unemployment in the Philippines.
Job and infrastructure in America. Job and infrastructure in Philippines.
What AMerica does. PhilGov in cahoots with peryodistas do.
TIP FOR THE POST: Do you know that debate of doleout versus infrastructure can be had in American Senate on-line? Or, reading American newspapers?
Renato, actually the Phil. Government should be doing this even before the so-called global crisis. It should be doing it even if there wasn’t a crisis. naturally, it is quite busy doing other things like imagining that its GDP is enough, year on year or that whatever success it has had was enough. whatever “success,” the philippine government has been patting itself in the back for the past decade or so isn’t enough. it isn’t doing enough. that’s my point.