Fiscal sustainability, equity, and allocative efficiency in the light of the 2019 supreme court ruling on the LGUs' share in national taxes

The Supreme Court (SC) ruled with finality in April 10, 2019 on the motions for reconsideration of its initial decision promulgated in July 3, 2018 on the petitions filed by separately by Mandanas et al. and Garcia regarding what petitioners perceived to be errors in the computation of the Internal Revenue Allotment (IRA) or the LGUs' share in national internal revenue taxes (NIRTs) as mandated under Section 284 of the 1991 Local Government Code (LGC). As a result, the IRA in 2022 will increase by P225.3 billion relative to what it would have been prior to promulgation of the said ruling to reach PhP 1,102.7 billion. This study proposes that said increase in the IRA be sourced by unfunding PAPs in the budgets of some national government agencies that are actually intended to deliver functions that are assigned to LGUs under the LGC with the end in view of ensuring sustainability of the national government's fiscal position. It then proceeds to these PAPs on the basis of the 2020 General Appropriations Act. It also evaluates the impact that this manner of financing the increase in the IRA has on the vertical fiscal balance across different levels of local government and horizontal fiscal balance across individual LGUs within each level of local government.