Cesar Virata's tenure as secretary/minister of Finance is the longest held by any head of department in Philippine history. This study reviews his contributions to the evolution and reform of the Philippine tax system which were significant, sustained and consistent. His contributions helped to...

Ferdinand E. Marcos was the Philippine president from 1966 to 1986, a period exceeding twenty years. After serving as a two-term president of the Philippines from 1966-1972, he declared martial law under the constitution to assume dictatorial powers to tame the political chaos that was then...

The Philippine peso appreciation has been creating serious problems for the economy because of the high degree of unemployment and poverty incidence in the country. More specifically, it threatens contraction of the export sector through loss of competitiveness. The paper tracks the exchange...

The Philippines became independent in 1946 but its legal and constitutional framework was erected in the 1935 Constitution. The 1987 Constitution did little to change these provisions in the midst of economic reforms that were undertaken to improve the legal basis of doing business and promoting...

The paper examines the Philippine labor market by fitting a labor supply equation using detailed firm data from the survey of manufactures. The Philippines continues to have high rates of unemployment and underemployment amidst a continuously rising labor supply. The results of the econometric...

Human capital formation in collegiate education can be partly measured by academic performance in a course. This study is based on students enrolled in the introductory course in the University of the Philippines under a single professor for the period 1998 to 2007. Data on the student's...

Two short memoirs are offered on the development of Philippine social sciences related to the contributions of two scholars. The first memoir is on Dr. Vernon W. Ruttan and the UP School of Economics during the 1960s. His contributions to the development of the UP School of Economics and of the...

The Philippines requires the revision of the economic provisions of the Constitution if it is to become a major recipient of foreign investment flows like other high growth economies in East Asia. These economic provisions were adopted in 1935 and have helped to reduce the country's ability to...

Human capital formation during youth, aside from the individual qualities of the student, is dependent in part on the quality of the schooling background. The determinants of academic performance of students (measured by their grade in the introductory economics course in the University of the...

Following an earlier paper titled 'Population and Poverty: The Real Score' (UPSE Discussion Paper 0415, December 2004), the present paper was first issued in August 2008 as a contribution to the public debate on the population issue that never seemed to die in this country. The debate heated up...