Believe It or
Not!
Flawed
statistics show unreliability of government data
Government’s constant
tampering with economic indicators serves to conceal its failed policies
that have worsened the country’s economic situation.
By IBON Media and Publications
Posted by Bulatlat
Government recently revealed once again
how its economic data cannot be trusted to provide a true picture of the
country’s economy. Last week, the country’s trade deficit figures for the
past three years were reported to be significantly under-declared after
government admitted it made major revisions to imports and exports data.
For 2004, the trade deficit was revised to
$4.3 billion from the $713 million figure earlier reported by the National
Statistics Office (NSO). The 2003 and 2002 trade deficit figures were
likewise revised to more than $4 billion. For these three years, the
cumulative trade deficit was understated by over $10 billion.
According to independent think-tank IBON
Foundation, this only spells more bad news for the country’s balance of
payments (BOP) position. For a dollar-dependent economy, a bigger trade
deficit means fewer dollars to pay for the country’s imports and debt
payment.
Economists said the revisions raised
further doubts about the reliability of Philippine economic data after
previous major revisions. Trade deficit data for 2000-2001 had earlier
been revised.
That Philippine economic data is not
reliable should not be surprising given how the Arroyo administration is
using revised methodologies to conceal harsh realities about the economy.
For example, the National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) has
reduced the poverty threshold several times to decrease the number of poor
Filipinos and obscure the true extent of poverty in the country. The NSO
has also redefined unemployment to reduce the count of unemployed workers.
Further, the Department of Finance has
removed intra-government borrowings as a part of the outstanding public
sector deficit (OPSD) to reduce public debt figures, while the Bangko
Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has added a 20 percent “raising factor” to hike
overseas Filipinos’ remittance estimates and improve balance of payments
accounts.
These changes not only make the
identification of trends difficult by making current data incompatible
with previous years’ estimates. More significantly, they serve to conceal
government’s failed policies that have worsened the country’s economic
situation. Posted by Bulatlat
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