Friendly Observer
By Arthur Keefe
There is more to governance
Recent statements by the Asian Development Bank
(ADB) and the World Bank (WB) recognize improvements in the Philippines, but
also draw attention to the need for further progress.
The areas they have concentrated on are the high levels of
poverty still tolerated here and the issue of governance.
These are connected. They applaud the Pantawid Pamilyang
Pilipino Program (4Ps) initiative, which for the first time, offers a small
degree of income redistribution, but consider it as only first step. For
example, it directs small amounts of income to poor children, but does nothing
for the elderly, the disabled, or other adults in poverty.
We have suffered the small scale abuse by officials
administering the scheme here in San Carlos and as I have commented before,
public support for this or any extension of the scheme requires an efficient
and crook-free administration. This may have been stopped now, but the lack of
consequences or repayment by the official concerned does not bode well for the
future. if people are seen to get away with fraud, what is to prevent others
from trying similar things in the future?
The World Bank welcomes the campaign to tackle the scourge of
corruption in public life but states that good government is much more than
this and the almost single minded effort to reduce corruption is diverting
attention from other equally important tasks of government.
The very low quality of education at all levels, the falling
percentage of college graduates, the absence of universal (even basic) health
care, and the failure of so called 'trickle down' economics, whereby the poor
and not-so-poor are supposed to benefit from the economic growth which is so
obviously benefiting the well-off. All of these represent a failure of
government over very many years.
Apologists for the present administration will point to the
Kindergaten + 12 years of Basic Education (K12) initiative but they also
concede that it is very late and inadequately resourced. They will point to the
free Philhealth cards, but acknowledge that they offer very limited benefits
and are not yet in the hands of many who need them. As for college graduates,
the absence of any strategic planning for manpower requirements, coupled with
further fee increases this year, will do nothing to remedy the serious skill
shortages in critical areas, such as engineering and technology. Not another
year of thousands of unemployable nurses and teachers!
My contention is not that the government is doing nothing, but
that it is doing far too little, far too slowly. As long as paying income taxes
is seen as optional, with corrupt Bureau of Internal Revenue practices and
corrupt businessmen and professionals failing to declare their true income, it
is hard to see government having the resources to really make a difference.
Many of those who are most ready to criticize the government
are those who cheat the system and the public by refusing to contribute their
dues.
The history of so called 'Welfare States' in Europe is not one
of unconditional philanthropy by wealthy governments.
Free education in the UK from 1870 was a response to the
growing might of Germany and the USA, threatening the British Empire.
Free health care and school meals were responses to the poor
health of army recruits needed to fight the Boer War in South Africa in 1900.
Unemployment and sickness benefits (cash payments) were
designed in the 1930s to aid the mobility of labor to deal with the Great
Depression.
In short, the basis for state welfare was not a moral
imperative, but an economic one, and to a degree, a political concession to the
emergent labor movement.
Similarly, spreading spending power across the population
through redistributive tax and benefits has the effect of promoting economic
growth and maintaining social stability. The wide inequality which
characterized Victorian England and most of Europe was not sustainable with a
universal franchise and an organized working class. Revolutions as occurred in
Russia and elsewhere were avoided by economic management in most of Europe.
Economic growth in the Philippines depends on a much wider
sharing of the benefits of growth. Social stability and the demise of the armed
militants also depend on people feeling they have the opportunity to develop
their talents and their standard of living. In short, to feel they have a stake
in creating and benefiting from a successful society.
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