What’s wrong with Uncle Sam … and the “little brown brother”

“America Is Now a ‘Second Tier’ Country … America leads the world when it comes to access to higher education. But when it comes to health, environmental protection, and fighting discrimination, it trails many other developed countries, according to the Social Progress Imperative, a U.S.-based nonprofit.

“The results of the group’s annual survey, which ranks nations based on 50 metrics, call to mind other reviews of national well-being, such as the World Happiness Report released in March, which was led by Norway, Denmark, and Iceland, or September’s Lancet study on sustainable development. In that one, Iceland, Singapore, Sweden, and the U.S. took spots 1, 2, 3, and 28—respectively.” [America Is Now a ‘Second Tier’ Country, Eric Roston, Bloomberg, 21st Jun 2017]

America may no longer be the land of milk and honey but over 3.5 million Filipinos call the US home … And there are over 10 million OFWs that remit close to $30-B. And it explains why we can have a consumption economy. But to add insult to injury, everyone is taking credit for this phenomenon ...

Thankfully, we are getting some unvarnished perspective of our reality. “Our manufacturing exports to Asean have surged since the early 2000s as import tariffs fell to zero in 2010, and the growth of the manufacturing sector sped up to 7-8 percent annually, faster than overall economic growth. Intermediate goods have assumed the largest share in our trade with Asean, reflecting our strong integration into the regional production networks and value chains.

“Even so, we have yet to catch up with our comparable Asean neighbors in export earnings, foreign direct investment inflows, tourism revenues, quantity and quality of infrastructure, and many other indicators of economic dynamism. While we nearly doubled our export earnings over what we got in the previous decade, our neighbors zoomed even faster, and actually widened the gap by which we fall behind. Vietnam used to earn about $10-15 billion more than we did from exports; now it exceeds ours by close to $100 billion! We have multiplied our foreign direct investment inflows nearly eightfold, from an annual average of $1 billion in the last decade, to $7.9 billion last year. But even that still puts us behind the original Asean 5, and Vietnam.

“We also need to address high poverty incidence and wide income gaps, environmental degradation, and vulnerability to natural disasters and climate change, which remain among our most daunting challenges as a nation. Vietnam achieved all the Millennium Development Goals well before the 2015 target year; we missed achieving nearly half of them, including the primary goal of halving our 1991 poverty rate.

“Even as a founding member of Asean, we have yet to take fuller advantage of opportunities for economic synergies offered by regional production networks and value chains. This especially applies to products of agriculture, where we have continued to restrict trade in rice and products of livestock and poultry, rather than benefit from the regional production networks that have rapidly emerged in these products. We have yet to eliminate longstanding constitutional and legal restrictions on foreign ownership in vital services such as transport, telecommunications, mass media and education. Among other things, these have led us to suffer the consequences of lack of competition in the provision of critical infrastructure facilities especially in transport, telecommunications (including internet), and energy. Particularly embarrassing is how we lag in implementing our National Single Window, an online one-stop platform for all import and export clearances aimed at facilitating trade, which needs to be linked to the regionwide Asean Single Window (ASW) platform. Right now, activation of the ASW cannot proceed because of us, even as we had the bravado in 2007 to volunteer to lead the initiative and chair the ASW Committee, a post we still hold.

“Chairmanship of Asean should go well beyond our President and other officials sitting at the head of the table as our Asean colleagues talk above our heads. Leadership demands setting a good example, and in Asean, I’m afraid we have yet to be a good example to be able to lead with authority.” [Setting the example in Asean, Cielito F. Habito, NO FREE LUNCH, Philippine Daily Inquirer, 23rd Jun 2017]

In other words, “pwede na ‘yan” keeps our optimism high even as the blog has argued we haven’t gotten to the root of our underdevelopment going back decades; and it can be described by the broad buckets of infrastructure development, industrialization and competitiveness.

We are so behind the curve that in the 21st century we are still talking (with no guarantees of execution) Build! Build! Build! – something that Malaysia under Mahathir, although he came 16 years after Marcos, undertook a generation ago. And to this day visitors to Malaysia will see ongoing infrastructure-building efforts.

In fairness to the Du30 administration, let’s hear them out. “Duterte administration banks on reforms in tax system to cut poverty in PHL,”Catherine Pillas, Jovee Marie N. dela Cruz, Rea Cu, BusinessMirror, 21st Jun 2017.

“Citing as an example Thailand, [Karl Kendrick Chua, chief economist and Department of Finance undersecretary] said the Philippines will need to generate P1.7 trillion in revenues just to match the growth of its Southeast Asian neighbor. He noted that Thailand has invested heavily in infrastructure, education and health.

‘If the entire CTRP (Comprehensive Tax Reform Program) is implemented by 2019, our GDP is P17 trillion, so 10 percent of that is P1.7 trillion. I will get P366 billion from tax policy, P433 billion from BIR, P208 billion from customs administration, P188 billion from non-underspending, with a remaining balance of P478 billion still,’ Chua said.

“That is why we have ODAs. So that is the big picture, a combination of sources to achieve development like Thailand.”

But what does industry, especially the biggest exporters, have to say? “Seipi (Semiconductors and Electronics Industries in the Philippines Inc.) President Dan C. Lachica expressed concern about the impact of the measure on the local suppliers. ‘This tax-reform bill is really very critical, what we’re concerned about is the levying of VAT on local suppliers to exporters or multinational companies in the Peza zone.’

‘That will kill our local suppliers and small-medium enterprises. The concern with the VAT refund system is if it will be efficient.’

“The Seipi chief said of the $28.8-billion electronics products exported by the Philippines, $22 billion consists of imports.” [Pillas, et al, op. cit.]

It appears the administration is not poised to hit a home run. Why a home run? Because we are playing catch up. “[W]e have yet to catch up with our comparable Asean neighbors in export earnings, foreign direct investment inflows, tourism revenues, quantity and quality of infrastructure, and many other indicators of economic dynamism. While we nearly doubled our export earnings over what we got in the previous decade, our neighbors zoomed even faster, and actually widened the gap by which we fall behind.” [Habito, op. cit.]

If we are to truly catch up, we need more than economic development per se, i.e., beyond the conventional wisdom of monetary and fiscal policies. We need an economic miracle. And that is why the blog has teed up a much grander vision for PH. It is called imagination – to dream and foresee the future, the true measure of the human species. Think the Singapore miracle, the Pearl River Delta Economic Development Zone, and the Asian Tigers – Taiwan, Singapore, South Korea and Hong Kong.

We need a model bigger than Thailand. And more to the point, Thailand’s efforts came at the time when the global economy was booming; and where global competition was not as intense as it is today. So much so that wealthy nations like the US and the UK are no longer the gold standards.

And as some would know, the inspiration of the blog are the writer’s Eastern European friends. They are not looking at – and benchmarking against – regional players but rather the world’s best and biggest players in their industry. Why? Even the likes of GE, P&G, Unilever and Nestlé are underperforming.

Because good enough is never good enough – as in “pwede na ‘yan”. 

And both Uncle Sam and PH better pay heed. “Trump Is What Happens When a Political Party Abandons Ideas,” Bruce Bartlett, Politico Magazine, 24th Jun 2017.

“Trump has turned out to be far, far worse than I imagined. He has instituted policies so right wing they make Ronald Reagan, for whom I worked, look like a liberal Democrat. He has appointed staff people far to the right of the Republican mainstream in many positions, and they are instituting policies that are frighteningly extreme.” Frighteningly extreme? Does that sound like Du30? But we have no qualms with hierarchy and paternalism – and even tyranny?

“Why independence, if the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow? And that they will be such is not to be doubted, for he who submits to tyranny loves it.” [We are ruled by Rizal’s ‘tyrants of tomorrow,’ Editorial, The Manila Times, 29th Dec 2015]

“As a major component for the education and reorientation of our people, mainstream media – their reporters, writers, photographers, columnists and editors – have an obligation to this country . . .” [Era of documented irrelevance: Mainstream media, critics and protesters, Homobono A. Adaza, The Manila Times, 25th Nov 2015]

“National prosperity is created, not inherited. It does not grow out of a country’s natural endowments, its labor pool, its interest rates, or its currency’s value, as classical economics insists . . . A nation’s competitiveness depends on the capacity of its industry to innovate and upgrade.” [The Competitive Advantage of Nations, Michael E. Porter, Harvard Business Review, March–April 1990]

“Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow.” [William Pollard, 1911-1989, physicist-priest, Manhattan Project]

“Development [is informed by a people’s] worldview, cognitive capacity, values, moral development, self-identity, spirituality, and leadership . . .” [Frederic Laloux, Reinventing organizations, Nelson Parker, 2014]

Can we get our act together?

Why is it that like clockwork we find ourselves distracted – unfocused, sidetracked and diverted – time and time again? Now we are engaged in debate if the declaration of martial law in Mindanao is legit. Or if in fact it can be extended beyond 60 days if not nationwide.

We are the New York Knicks, not the Golden State Warriors. Do we know how to play catch-up? It is playing above and beyond, not “pwede na ‘yan” or “bahala na” – which translates to what Trump calls losers.

Can we establish our true north or must we first internalize that foresight is what distinguishes the genius of man? And we cannot simply dismiss what we call the unfettered free market of the West or the curtailed freedom of the Asian Tigers. There is a middle ground that we must seek. To find his place in the sun, Juan de la Cruz must be a man of vision and values. To the writer’s grandfather, it is called backbone.

As some would know, the writer’s maternal grandfather – an admirer of Rizal – and who became a Mason but let his wife raise the children as Catholics being herself a Catholic, called out the backbone of Juan de la Cruz or the lack if not the absence of it.

Does the war on drugs qualify as our true north? What about the war against ISIS?

Indeed, Mindanao in and of itself is a complex problem. If there is anything worse than PH underdevelopment, it is Mindanao underdevelopment. Its underdevelopment magnified the sense of rejection felt by our Muslim brothers and sisters – which makes Mindanao a fertile ground for insurgency.

Yet we say they are part of us because our Constitution says so. [Do we ever ask if we sound like the scribes and the Pharisees?] It parallels our own homes: we have a maid’s room that is not equal to our room. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. A second-class citizen will behave like a second-class citizen. But we take it for granted given our hierarchical instincts.

We brought the problem of Mindanao upon ourselves as much as we brought PH underdevelopment upon ourselves. And until we take personal responsibility to find our place in the sun we shall be the laughingstock of the region if not the world.

And problem-solving is not one-dimensional as in Federalism will wipe our tears away. Especially if our values of hierarchy, paternalism, political patronage and oligarchy cannot make us commit to and live by the rule of law. Or why innovation calls for both the soft and hard sciences; while competition demands an egalitarian ethos. We can be out of sync with what the world is about at our peril.

For decades, we haven’t gotten to the root of our underdevelopment. Think Singapore. Development – read prosperity – gave their different ethnic groups a compelling reason to live together.

And while Marawi is headline news, we are debating if it is PPP or ODA. But the real challenge is, is it Build! Build! Build! or the imperative of an ecosystem – founded on infrastructure development, industrialization and competitiveness? In other words, we must connect the dots. It’s called foresight. 

We must overcome circular debates cum crab mentality – think conservatives versus liberals in the US and the UK, and who would think that the once vaunted Anglo-Saxon team will go through rough patches, while the Frenchman Macron wants to ditch the divisions between left and right – if we are to erect “the must” ecosystem, one that will lift us up from decades of underdevelopment.

Of course, we have pockets of competitiveness – and tycoons and global enterprises. But they don’t lift our ranking in the metrics of development, and remain the regional laggard. Our value of hierarchy and paternalism nourishes political patronage and oligarchy that in turn defined us.

And because ours is a restrictive economy, we are digging ourselves deeper in the hole given we are not developing farm teams or a deep bench that can compete in a highly globalized world. Will we ever realize that parochialism and insularity exact a heavy price? Not if hierarchy and paternalism locks us inside the box of destiny unable to imagine and visualize far out into the future. To instinctively imagine and visualize the future means one is forward-looking and forward-thinking.

Think Trump who built his business via political patronage and a network of foreign oligarchy. Not surprisingly, he wants to undo American exceptionalism. Not surprisingly as well, exemplars of American innovation are not in bed with him. 

What we in the Philippines need is to create the ecosystem that will drive development. And the blog has teed up the Singapore miracle, the Pearl River Delta Economic Development Zone and Iskandar Malaysia as models we can learn from; as well as the Asian Tigers and the up-and-coming ones – being living examples captured by the body of knowledge on the journey from poverty to prosperity that resides at Oxford University.

Yet our national conversation continues to reinforce and perpetuate sub-optimization – which is anathema to excellence. Or simply put, we’re neither here nor there. And why perhaps the grandfather called out our backbone.

And despite a world that is rapidly evolving especially because of innovation and globalization – notwithstanding Brexit and why Macron won and May shamed – we can’t help but point to the downside of technology given how underdeveloped we are.

Clearly we see both sides of the same coin. As consumers of technology, we partake and indulge in it; but given we’re not the creators of technology, we are fearful. Fear of the unknown is indeed terrifying.

And that is what Trump and the Brexiteers exploited.

And which is why the blog talks about the writer’s Eastern European friends. They are constantly working – internally (among themselves) and externally (with partners from the developed world that were drawn by their persistence to excel, including the writer and why he stayed on well beyond his one month commitment) that product development and R&D-wise they live in the future – to create products meant to raise man’s wellbeing.

Yet, it does not have to be earthshaking as the blog pointed out in the case of Palawan tourism. If we connect the dots, it is not rocket science to figure out that we need toilet facilities especially along the most popular routes to make the Palawan tourism product experience truly pleasant and agreeable – and worth a repeat buy and another and another …

More to the point, we have been promoting MSMEs for decades as a livelihood undertaking or a job-creation initiative – ever conscious of their limited access to capital. In other words, we see enterprise as a finance-driven exercise – and not surprisingly, we value oligarchy and pigeon-hole people into capital or labor, rich or poor as in destiny.

Think Edison or Jobs or Gates or Zuckerberg, that is, to create something of value that will respond to human needs – to serve humanity, as Tim Cook echoed the mantra of Steve Jobs.

It starts in the mind a.k.a. foresight. The writer’s Eastern European friends did not have the means if capital is the basis of imagining and visualizing the future. And it explains why our MSMEs deliver a hugely disproportionate lower economic contribution even when they represent more than 99% of registered enterprises.

Garry Kasparov, who battled technology in the person of Big Blue on the chessboard, appreciates why the human species stand alone … robots can follow instructions but are too dumb to dream.

Do we need to learn to dream as a people to develop the foresight that is inherent in each of us – and once and for all toss “pwede na ‘yan” and “bahala na”? [As well as discard our culture of impunity! If we need another People Power, it must be to discard this culture that we say we abhor but live with – take our value of oligarchy.] And get our act together and confidently traverse the way forward for Juan de la Cruz? 

“Why independence, if the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow? And that they will be such is not to be doubted, for he who submits to tyranny loves it.” [We are ruled by Rizal’s ‘tyrants of tomorrow,’ Editorial, The Manila Times, 29th Dec 2015]

“As a major component for the education and reorientation of our people, mainstream media – their reporters, writers, photographers, columnists and editors – have an obligation to this country . . .” [Era of documented irrelevance: Mainstream media, critics and protesters, Homobono A. Adaza, The Manila Times, 25th Nov 2015]

“National prosperity is created, not inherited. It does not grow out of a country’s natural endowments, its labor pool, its interest rates, or its currency’s value, as classical economics insists . . . A nation’s competitiveness depends on the capacity of its industry to innovate and upgrade.” [The Competitive Advantage of Nations, Michael E. Porter, Harvard Business Review, March–April 1990]

“Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow.” [William Pollard, 1911-1989, physicist-priest, Manhattan Project]

“Development [is informed by a people’s] worldview, cognitive capacity, values, moral development, self-identity, spirituality, and leadership . . .” [Frederic Laloux, Reinventing organizations, Nelson Parker, 2014]

What would Rizal say?

As we celebrated another Independence Day, should we be asking Who are we and what are we? And where are we? [Du30 apparently was attending to Marawi that he didn’t make it to the celebration.] “Why independence, if the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow? And that they will be such is not to be doubted, for he who submits to tyranny loves it.” [We are ruled by Rizal’s ‘tyrants of tomorrow,’ Editorial, The Manila Times, 29th Dec 2015]

“It is said that Francis’ great prayer, which he would spend whole nights praying, was ‘Who are you, God? And who am I?’ Contemplative prayer helps us to live into these questions. Who am I? As we observe our minds in contemplation, first we recognize how many of our thoughts are defensive, oppositional, paranoid, self-referential … Saint Francis is what some call a prime attractor’—one who moves history and humanity forward just by being who he is.” [Richard Rohr's Daily Meditation, 9th Jun 2017]

But let’s bring that to the here and now. “He wanted to empower the crazy ones—the misfits, the rebels and the troublemakers, the round pegs, and the square holes—to do the best work. If we could just do that, Steve [Jobs] knew we could really change the world.

“Before that moment, I had never met a leader with such passion or encountered a company with such a clear and compelling purpose: to serve humanity. It was just that simple. Serve humanity. And it was in that moment, after 15 years of searching, something clicked. I finally felt aligned. Aligned with a company that brought together challenging, cutting edge work with a higher purpose. Aligned with a leader who believed that technology which didn’t exist yet could reinvent tomorrow’s world. Aligned with myself and my own deep need to serve something greater …

“MIT and Apple share so much. We both love hard problems. We love the search for new ideas, and we especially love finding those ideas, the really big ones, the ones that can change the world.” [Tim Cook delivers MIT’S 2017 commencement speech, 9th June 2017]

But we are Pinoys. Who are we and what are we? Which brings Fr. Bulatao to mind. “Fr. Jaime C. Bulatao introduced group dynamics in the Philippines and wrote The Technique of Group Discussion (1965). He advocated the importance of understanding of the Filipino psyche, and undertook studies on Filipino culture, and the phenomena of spirituality and consciousness.  This led to his seminal Phenomena and their Interpretation: Landmark Essays 1957–1989 (1992).

“As a clinical psychologist, Fr. Bu aimed to find the kind of therapy best suited for Filipinos, experimenting with different alternatives that combined both his knowledge of Western methods and his understanding of the local culture … At the turn of the century, he devoted most of his time grounding his thoughts about relationships through numbers and quantitative methods.” [Jose Ramon T Villarin SJ, President, Ateneo de Manila University, 11th Feb 2015]

Fr. Bulatao, had he lived longer, would be well on the way to the Filipino pursuit of innovation, having trained his thoughts on the soft and the hard sciences. Why is that important? Ideology, think Padre Damaso since we're talking about Rizal, nor pure algorithm can’t be the fountain of innovation. 

Tim Cook explains: “As Steve once said, technology alone is not enough. It is technology married with the liberal arts married with the humanities that make our hearts sing. When you keep people at the center of what you do, it can have an enormous impact. It means an iPhone that allows the blind person to run a marathon. It means an Apple Watch that catches a heart condition before it becomes a heart attack. It means an iPad that helps a child with autism connect with his or her world. In short, it means technology infused with yourvalues, making progress possible for everyone.

“Whatever you do in your life, and whatever we do at Apple, we must infuse it with the humanity that each of us is born with. That responsibility is immense, but so is the opportunity.”

Which brings another Jesuit to mind, Fr. Vitaliano “George” R. Gorospe. “A grinning, joking, laughing Fr. George, as he is fondly called, fills their remembering. Beneath his jovial and vivacious demeanor, however, is a teacher's seriousness and purposefulness in inspiring and challenging them to be men and women of faith, justice, and compassion.” [Dr. Ma. Christina A. Astorga, Theology Department, January 28, 2002]

This isn’t the first time the blog brought up Fr. George. The writer, though not an Atenean, is proud to call him a friend, and so does the wife. And the one vivid recollection they have is Fr. George’s non-stop challenge re reality.

But it was not until many years later, dense as he was, would the writer find it a powerful thinking tool. And today his Eastern European friends likewise find it to be so. Which gives them lots of confidence in their pursuit of innovation and global competition. Ever diligent with their homework to understand human needs given their commitment to raise man’s wellbeing. That innovation is not for innovation’s sake. [To put that in perspective, the biggest business in their portfolio which they created 15 years ago – from zero knowledge – to compete against the West’s (read world’s) largest player in the category in their home market, today has > 39% share against the latter’s 20%.]

But let’s get back to PH. “United States special forces are providing support to the Philippine military battling to dislodge Islamist militants in a southern city, the US embassy said Saturday, as 13 Filipino Marines were killed in fresh fighting.

“The announcement of US help in the embattled southern region comes after President Rodrigo Duterte has sought to reduce the Philippines’ reliance on the United States and build much closer ties with China and Russia.

“Philippine troops are struggling to defeat hundreds of fighters, who rampaged through Marawi on May 23 flying black flags of the Islamic State group, and have used bomb-proof tunnels, anti-tank weapons and civilians as human shields to fortify their positions.

“Friday’s ferocious, street-to-street gun battles with the militants saw 13 troops killed in a dramatic surge in the toll from the conflict.” [US backs fight vs Maute, Dempsey Reyes, The Manila Times, 11th Jun 2017]

Did we not say this was a surgical intervention, meaning, it was as simple as cut and paste? But we said the same thing with the war on drugs? Where are we? Who are we and what are we?

We were proud to kick out the occupants of Clark and Subic. Yet we all know wealthy nations rely on the US military. What is reality? It is only the Americans that can spend over $600-B in the military while in pursuit of a set of universal values, which they call an experiment. Where is China or Russia? Are they similarly committed to these values? And let’s not interject our paternalistic needs when we look outward. Let’s learn to take personal responsibility to find our place in the sun.

And the blog won’t tire to call us out, given it is our reality: Parochial and insular; hierarchical and paternalistic; political patronage and dynasties; and oligarchic; that when all is said and done, a culture of impunity.

“Why independence, if the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow? And that they will be such is not to be doubted, for he who submits to tyranny loves it.” [We are ruled by Rizal’s ‘tyrants of tomorrow,’ Editorial, The Manila Times, 29th Dec 2015]

“As a major component for the education and reorientation of our people, mainstream media – their reporters, writers, photographers, columnists and editors – have an obligation to this country . . .” [Era of documented irrelevance: Mainstream media, critics and protesters, Homobono A. Adaza, The Manila Times, 25th Nov 2015]

“National prosperity is created, not inherited. It does not grow out of a country’s natural endowments, its labor pool, its interest rates, or its currency’s value, as classical economics insists . . . A nation’s competitiveness depends on the capacity of its industry to innovate and upgrade.” [The Competitive Advantage of Nations, Michael E. Porter, Harvard Business Review, March–April 1990]

“Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow.” [William Pollard, 1911-1989, physicist-priest, Manhattan Project]

“Development [is informed by a people’s] worldview, cognitive capacity, values, moral development, self-identity, spirituality, and leadership . . .” [Frederic Laloux, Reinventing organizations, Nelson Parker, 2014]

Survival of the fittest II

Is it the one reality that subconsciously we resent that we confuse compassion and sympathy with paternalism and overprotection? And instinctively we rely on others to propel us, like today it’s China and/or Russia? Not a surprise given our leader dependency and paternalistic needs.

It may not be second nature but we must step up and take personal responsibility to find our place in the sun. Consider the following exposition re survival of the fittest:

“The Matthew Effect, ‘For all those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance; but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away . . . The Amazon rainforest is one of the most diverse ecosystems on Earth. Scientists have cataloged approximately 16,000 different tree species in the Amazon. But despite this remarkable level of diversity, researchers have discovered that there are approximately 227 ‘hyperdominant’ tree species that make up nearly half of the rainforest. Just 1.4 percent of tree species account for 50 percent of the trees in the Amazon.

“Imagine two plants growing side by side. Each day they will compete for sunlight and soil. If one plant can grow just a little bit faster than the other, then it can stretch taller, catch more sunlight, and soak up more rain. The next day, this additional energy allows the plant to grow even more. This pattern continues until the stronger plant crowds the other out and takes the lion’s share of sunlight, soil, and nutrients.

“While 77 different nations have competed in the World Cup, just three countries—Brazil, Germany, and Italy—have won 13 of the first 20 World Cup tournaments . . .  Just two franchises—the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers—have won nearly half of all the championships in NBA history . . . In the 1950s, three percent of Guatemalans owned 70 percent of the land in Guatemala. In 2013, 8.4 percent of the world population controlled 83.3 percent of the world's wealth. In 2015, one search engine, Google, received 64 percent of search queries.

“Like plants in the rainforest, humans are often competing for the same resources . . . From [its] advantageous position, the winning plant has a better ability to spread seeds and reproduce, which gives the species an even bigger footprint in the next generation. This process gets repeated again and again until the plants that are slightly better than the competition dominate the entire forest.

“Scientists refer to this effect as ‘accumulative advantage.’ What begins as a small advantage gets bigger over time. One plant only needs a slight edge in the beginning to crowd out the competition and take over the entire forest.

“[T]he process of accumulative advantage is the hidden engine that drives the 80/20 Rule . . . Sometime in the late 1800s—nobody is quite sure exactly when—a man named Vilfredo Pareto was fussing about in his garden when he made a small but interesting discovery. Pareto noticed that a tiny number of pea pods in his garden produced the majority of the peas.

“As he continued researching, Pareto found that the numbers were never quite the same, but the trend was remarkably consistent. The majority of rewards always seemed to accrue to a small percentage of people. This idea that a small number of things account for the majority of the results became known as the Pareto Principle or, more commonly, the 80/20 Rule.

“Small differences in performance can lead to very unequal distributions when repeated over time. This is yet another reason why habits are so important. The people and organizations that can do the right things, more consistently are more likely to maintain a slight edge and accumulate disproportionate rewards over time.” [The 1% rule explains why a few people end up with most of the rewards, James Clear, JamesClear.com, Business Insider, 30th May 2017]

Do we wonder why Singapore and the rest of the Asian Tigers and the up-and-coming ones continue to leave us in the dust? We want to write our own recipe book – a.k.a. “Pinoy abilidad” – instead of replicating what our neighbors have done? But what we want is not what the world is about – and why we must recognize the body of knowledge that is out there. On the other hand, it is. Those that cannot evolve and develop go extinct, which isn’t the first time the blog has raised Darwin. [And it isn’t the first time the blog has raised the Pareto Principle.]

And we applaud Du30, given our leader dependency, for pivoting away from the West into the arms of China and Russia, and embracing Putin and Trump – wanting to write his own recipe book. But Trump is not what Darwin speaks to. He refuses to evolve and develop that the cream-of-the crop of the US CEO community, including those in the oil industry, are distancing themselves from him. Instead of American exceptionalism, Trump is taking America back to the stone age.

Trump behaves like Philippine oligarchy – being the poster boy of political patronage, and then some.

“David Gergen, who advised former Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton, strongly called out Trump's decision . . . 

‘Some 70 years ago, the United States entered an international agreement called the Marshall Plan, when we came to the aid of Europe, and it was one of the noblest acts in human history,’ he said. ‘Today we walked away from the rest of the world, and it's one of the most shameful acts in our history.’

“Gergen added that ‘we're the largest contributor to carbon dioxide in the world, and for us to walk away as this carbon dioxide threatens the future of our grandchildren -- for us to walk away from that, it's grotesquely irresponsible.’

“He also predicted that the decision ‘will widely be seen around the world as a terrible, terrible setback for the planet,’ and that poor nations will pay the greatest price for global warming, even though the US has contributed the most to global warming while poor nations have contributed the least.” [Gergen: Why Trump committed one of US's most shameful acts, Jason Squitieri, CNN, 2nd Jun 2017]

That’s how Trump is perceived by someone who knows the Oval Office first hand through different occupants. But Du30 sees Trump differently – because birds of the same feather flock together.

Yet we must – especially the chattering classes – figure out why we’re stuck in this Pinoy paradigm. Because if we cannot look in the mirror and answer the question, where are we, we can’t learn to be forward-looking and forward-thinking.

The failure will leave us unequipped for the journey from poverty to prosperity. It is not a walk in the park and demands that we establish where we want to be and how we will get there. Recall that the human species aren’t meant to live in the moment – as in que sera, sera – which is what sets us apart.

“Why independence, if the slaves of today will be the tyrants of tomorrow? And that they will be such is not to be doubted, for he who submits to tyranny loves it.” [We are ruled by Rizal’s ‘tyrants of tomorrow,’ Editorial, The Manila Times, 29th Dec 2015]

“As a major component for the education and reorientation of our people, mainstream media – their reporters, writers, photographers, columnists and editors – have an obligation to this country . . .” [Era of documented irrelevance: Mainstream media, critics and protesters, Homobono A. Adaza, The Manila Times, 25th Nov 2015]

“National prosperity is created, not inherited. It does not grow out of a country’s natural endowments, its labor pool, its interest rates, or its currency’s value, as classical economics insists . . . A nation’s competitiveness depends on the capacity of its industry to innovate and upgrade.” [The Competitive Advantage of Nations, Michael E. Porter, Harvard Business Review, March–April 1990]

“Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow.” [William Pollard, 1911-1989, physicist-priest, Manhattan Project]

“Development [is informed by a people’s] worldview, cognitive capacity, values, moral development, self-identity, spirituality, and leadership . . .” [Frederic Laloux, Reinventing organizations, Nelson Parker, 2014]