PH competitiveness is built at its permit counters

On a recent trip to Singapore, I met with former colleagues who had worked in the Philippines in the 90s. Everyone asked the same question. Why is a country so rich in potential still struggling to secure its fair share of global investment? Most answers pointed to the same reason: persistent structural frictions that make doing business here far more complicated and costly than it should be. Here is a puzzle. The Philippines is now officially an upper-middle-income country. In June, it climbed

On a recent trip to Singapore, I met with former colleagues who had worked in the Philippines in the 90s. Everyone asked the same question. Why is a country so rich in potential still struggling to secure its fair share of global investment? Most answers pointed to the same reason: persistent structural frictions that make doing business here far more complicated and costly than it should be. Here is a puzzle. The Philippines is now officially an upper-middle-income country. In June, it climbed