Two key recent events pushed forward the country's decentralization agenda. In 2019, the Mandanas-Garcia Supreme Court ("Mandanas") ruling increased the tax base for intergovernmental fiscal transfers in support of local governments' autonomy and revenue-raising capacity. In 2021, Executive...

The COVID-19 pandemic, and lockdown measures taken to control its spread, brought economies to a halt, turning the public health crisis into an economic one. Though government responses, such as labor and social welfare protection programs, were similar for recent economic crises like the Global...

With the country still managing the COVID-19 pandemic, the election of national and local officials next year, and an increase in resources available to local governments units (LGUs) with the implementation of the Supreme Court ruling on the Mandanas-Garcia petition, major shifts in Philippine...

This study examines the fiscal implications of the current criteria of establishing the fiscal viability of local governments in the Philippines. Since the passing of the Local Government Code (LGC) of 1991 thirty years ago, the criteria used to create/convert a local government unit (LGU),...

This paper examines whether the current level of debt in the country, given the national government's fiscal policy and plans, remains on a sustainable path. By end-2021, a year after the peak of the public health and economic crisis brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, the country's...

The 2023 Philippine national budget was drafted on the eve of the election of a new president. While aiming to sustain the recovery from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic and address economic scarring, the new administration needs to manage the implementation of the Mandanas-Garcia Supreme...

The Public Management Development Program (PMDP), the National Government Career Executive Service Development Program (NGCESDP), was revitalized in 2012 through Republic Act 10155 or the General Appropriations Act of 2012. The Program is the government's response to the government's aim of...

The COVID-19 pandemic, and lockdown measures taken to control its spread, brought economies to a halt, turning the public health crisis into an economic one. Though government responses, such as labor and social welfare protection programs, were similar for recent economic crises like the Global...