Christmas Figures

Some numbers I got from reading December’s Newsbreak, and some from newspaper editorials, appropriate for the 12 days of Christmas:

1.) 33% of the national budget will go to interest payments. Not even debt payments.
2.) 11 UP (school of Economics) professors warns of financial meltdown if government does not act on the budget deficit and reduce its 5.4 trillion debt.
3.) 6 months since Arroyo was “elected” into office. From what I hear, the amount she borrowed already totaled to the borrowings of 2 presidents combined.
4.) 451,309 corporations are registered with SEC. But only 113,145 firms have field their corporate income tax, and only 10,833 actually paid taxes.
5.) 29++ per liter of gas. 5.50 jeep minimum fare.
6.) 76.7 billion income tax yield: 87.8% was paid by workers and employees through automatically withheld taxes. A newspaper editorial goes: “Joblessness. High Prices. The middle class has little flexibility left. They are most resentful of the costs of bad government.”
7.) 4,000,000 families living below poverty line.
8.) 15,000 pesos in electric bills for 1024, 1022, and 1019 Nakpil. 7,000 in 1022 alone.
9.) 2.5% increase in family income from 2000 to 2003, but prices of commodities shot up to almost 14%.
10.) 4 Filipinos are born every minute. Growth in enrollment declined from 7.63% in 2001 to 3.94% in 2003.
11.) 1 – the number of sections in Letran Grade 5 elementary. It was 5 during my time.
12.) 30 pesos – taxi flag down rate. If I remember it correctly, it was 2.50 pesos when I was growing up in the eighties. Now it’s 2.50 pesos for each drop of the meter.

We wish you a merry Christmas (3x) and a Happy New Year.