Labour Remittances and National Development in the Philippines

• Main Authors: Yueh-sheng Chen, 陳躍升
• Other Authors: Ching-lung Tsay
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/92851458133483242128

碩士 === 淡江大學 === 東南亞研究所碩士班 === 98 === Due to historical, political and economical reasons, Filipinos tend to look for better jobs and higher wages abroad. Although the Philippines had a speedy economic growth in the 1960s and 1970s, the economy stagnated after the 1970s. In the meanwhile, the Philippines labor market also had acute problems—unemployment and underemployment. As a result, people in the Philippines would make working abroad as subsistent strategy, and even develop a culture of migration. As of December 2007, an estimated 8 million Filipinos worked or resided overseas (called Overseas Filipino Worker, OFW), and about 30% are classified temporary status or contract workers (called Overseas Contract Worker, OCW). The total amount of remittances is estimated at 16.4 billion dollars in 2008, next only to Mexico and China. In 1995-2004, the average remittance of overseas workers is 1,384 dollars, and men’s average remittance is higher than women’s. The average remittance of professional workers is the highest, but the total remittance of unskilled workers is the biggest. Most of remittances were made by bank transfer system, Door-to-Door service, or hand-carried format. Utilizing several indicators of economic development and remittances, this paper examines the relationship between remittances and the development of the Philippines. First, remittances has become the major income source of workers’ family, and increasing number of families depend on remittances to consume, pay the debt and offer education to children. Second, at the national level, the amount of remittance is higher than other sources in the Philippines. Large remittances can improve the balance of payment and increase the funding for national development. Finally, this paper uses the poverty conditions, the emigrant percentage, and remittance-receiving percentage in regions of origin in the Philippines to figure out the relationship between remittances and poverty alleviation. The regions with higher emigrant percentage and remittance-receiving percentage tend to have a decreasing poverty headcounts. The causal relationship needs to be further assessed.