Looking at Conditions of Persons with Disability in Metro Manila

How comprehensive and accurate is our knowledge and understanding of one vulnerable sector in our society--the people with disability? How can the government help improve their lives in the long run so that they will become more productive members of society? This Policy Note looks into this concern.persons with disability

Child Poverty in the Philippines: More Children Suffer as Poverty Rises

Who suffer most in times of poverty, crises, and calamities? What is the current situation of children in the Philippines amid poverty and hunger? Reyes and Tabuga show that as poverty worsens, more children suffer. Read more.poverty, child poverty

Understanding the Extent, Composition, and Characteristics of the Poor

Probing deeper into the poverty picture, this Policy Note examines the extent, composition, and characteristics of the poor, using various rounds of the Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES) and Annual Poverty Indicator Survey (APIS) as panel data sets. Understanding these aspects could provide insights that may guide the government in formulating specific types of interventions for different groups of households, especially the chronic and transient poor.Philippines, chronic poor, transient poor, panel data

International Remittances and Family Expenditure Patterns: the Philippines` Case

This paper examines the influence of overseas remittances to patterns of family expenditures in the Philippines using a matched dataset of the Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES) and the Labor Force Survey (LFS). The objective is to study whether or not remittances influence budget allocation of families receiving these income transfers. Specifically, it is interesting to check if families with remittances tend to allocate more on say education, healthcare, and housing thereby increasing the development impact of remittances or if they tend to budget more conspicuously on vices and consumer items and hence may forego their chance to maximize gains from remittances. This is becoming an important question amidst many issues of labor migration as the country continues to send hundreds of thousands of its labor abroad. This paper estimated a system of demand equations. The dataset has been adjusted to reflect a more accurate definition of remittances from abroad by excluding the investment dividends and pension components in the FIES remittance data as recommended in previous studies. Likewise, the paper attempts to address the endogeneity issue in studying remittance effects and the presence of zero values in expenditure data.remittances, Philippines, remittance income effect, household expenditures/spending

International Remittances and Household Expenditures : The Philippine Case

This paper examines the general relationship between remittances and household expenditures in the Philippines by doing a cross-sectional analysis of the 2003 Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES). Unlike past research works, it provides a comprehensive overview of the effect of remittance on spending behavior by looking not only at common categories like food, education, and housing but also vices like tobacco and alcohol. It addressed some methodological issues in examining remittance effects. These are the presence of zero expenditures, heterogeneity of the nationally representative sample, and inaccuracy of the FIES data on remittance. Zero expenditures were taken into account by using the censored Tobit model while heterogeneity was addressed by employing the Quantile Regression technique. Also, the FIES data on remittances was corrected by excluding the investment and pension components from the original remittance data used by past studies to arrive at more accurate estimate of remittances sent by family members working abroad and its effects. The study found that while there are evidences that households receiving remittances tend to consume more conspicuously on consumer items, they also invest more on education, housing, medical care and durable goods. There is no clear relationship though between remittances and tobacco and alcohol.remittances, remittance income effect, household expenditures/spending, quantile regression analysis

International Remittances and Family Expenditure Patterns: the Philippines’ Case

This paper examines the influence of overseas remittances to patterns of family expenditures in the Philippines using a matched dataset of the Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES) and the Labor Force Survey (LFS). The objective is to study whether or not remittances influence budget allocation of families receiving these income transfers. Specifically, it is interesting to check if families with remittances tend to allocate more on say education, healthcare, and housing thereby increasing the development impact of remittances or if they tend to budget more conspicuously on vices and consumer items and hence may forego their chance to maximize gains from remittances. This is becoming an important question amidst many issues of labor migration as the country continues to send hundreds of thousands of its labor abroad. This paper estimated a system of demand equations. The dataset has been adjusted to reflect a more accurate definition of remittances from abroad by excluding the investment dividends and pension components in the FIES remittance data as recommended in previous studies. Likewise, the paper attempts to address the endogeneity issue in studying remittance effects and the presence of zero values in expenditure data.remittances, Philippines, remittance income effect, household expenditures/spending

International Remittances and Household Expenditures: The Philippine Case

This paper examines the general relationship between remittances and household expenditures in the Philippines by doing a cross-sectional analysis of the 2003 Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES). Unlike past research works, it provides a comprehensive overview of the effect of remittance on spending behavior by looking not only at common categories like food, education, and housing but also vices like tobacco and alcohol. It addressed some methodological issues in examining remittance effects. These are the presence of zero expenditures, heterogeneity of the nationally representative sample, and inaccuracy of the FIES data on remittance. Zero expenditures were taken into account by using the censored Tobit model while heterogeneity was addressed by employing the Quantile Regression technique. Also, the FIES data on remittances was corrected by excluding the investment and pension components from the original remittance data used by past studies to arrive at more accurate estimate of remittances sent by family members working abroad and its effects. The study found that while there are evidences that households receiving remittances tend to consume more conspicuously on consumer items, they also invest more on education, housing, medical care and durable goods. There is no clear relationship though between remittances and tobacco and alcohol.remittances, remittance income effect, household expenditures/spending, quantile regression analysis

Factors Motivating Participation of Persons with Disability in the Philippines: The Discount Privilege in Goods and Services

In urban Philippines, the percentage of persons with disability (PWDs) participating in various government and nongovernment programs is low. In fact, the level of awareness among PWDs on the policies that intend to uplift their well-being is also low. These were some of the findings of a 2008 survey on persons with disability in selected cities in Metro Manila. This paper therefore aims to examine this problem by looking at the various factors that influence the PWD`s participation specifically in the government-mandated discount on fare on bus and other land transportation vehicles and medical services. Interestingly, it focuses on the role of social networks among PWD, environmental constraints, and the type of disability the person has. Interestingly, because participation is conditional on awareness and eligibility, this paper likewise looks into variables that are associated with awareness and eligibility. The goal is to identify areas of potential gaps in terms of information dissemination, implementation, and enforcement so that PWDs can fully benefit from the policies and programs intended for them. This paper uses the dataset of a pioneering survey on 400 PWDs conducted in 2008 in Metro Manila.Philippines, disability, participation, Philippine survey on PWD

Disability and Gender: The Case of the Philippines

Addressing gender gaps is a major development objective anywhere in the world. This paper aims to illustrate that this is far more critical in the presence of another social layer – disability. Among persons with disability (PWDs), the gap between men and women are more distinct, their conditions more dismal with poverty as their needs are different. Apart from poverty, discrimination and prejudice are the major challenges that persons with disabilities face in their everyday life. Because they face various social, physical, and economic barriers, policies should gear toward formulating rights-based and comprehensive actions to improve their well-being. In formulation of effective policy actions, data and information are critical. However, data collection on disability in many countries is at an early stage of development because it is given low priority or often excluded from official statistics. The ESCAP noted that the lack of availability and the quality of demographic and socioeconomic indicators concerning disability continue to be major challenges. This paper aims to fill in this information gap. It discusses the conditions of men and women with disability using a set of pioneering surveys conducted in the Philippines. The goal is to illustrate the gender disparities and to draw useful insights on how stakeholders can address this issue.Philippines, persons with disability (PWDs), gender studies

A Note on Economic Growth, Inequality, and Poverty in the Philippines

This paper examines the relationship among poverty, economic growth, and inequality by decomposing poverty changes at subnational levels. The results were examined against the performances of the different economic sectors in the regions to understand the relationships while accounting for the nature of growth. Moreover, the poverty elasticity of output growth was estimated using regional-level data in 2003, 2006, and 2009. We learned that while the rate of growth matters a lot in poverty reduction, the redistribution of income matters as well. More importantly, we find that, at a given rate of growth, the response of poverty rate to growth is higher when income distribution is less unequal.poverty, decomposition, inequality, Philippines, GLS regression, random effects, Gini decomposition