In his column, Fel Maragay goes into the pros and cons of the idea.Bloomberg reports inflation has probably accelerated for a second month: Associated Press reports further rise in stock market driven in part by China’s decision to increase its tax on stock purchases; in the Business Mirror, details on the winners and gainers with the 1st Quarter numbers:The agriculture, fishery and forestry sector grew 4.2 percent; industry at 5.3 percent and services at 9.1 percent—the latter growth being the highest since 1983, prompting economic officials to describe it as the linchpin in the economy.Services contributed 4.4 percentage points to overall GDP growth, followed by industry with 1.7 percentage points and agriculture fishery and forestry with 0.8 percentage point.Among other production side indicators in the first quarter, manufacturing gross value added slowed to 4.6 percent from 5 percent during the same period last year; construction went down to an 8.6-percent growth from 10.7 percent; trade up to 9.1 percent from 5.3 percent; private services increased pace to 8.9 percent from 7.7 percent, and government services posted a 7.1-percent growth from 3.7 percent.“There are some indications that some manufacturing establishments are increasingly engaging in other economic activities, particularly, trading,” Romulo A.  Virola, secretary-general of the National Statistical Coordination Board, said of the sector’s continued major contribution to industry despite a seeming slowdown.On the expenditure side, personal consumption expenditure picked up to 5.9 percent from 5.3 percent; government consumption to 13.1 percent from 7.6 percent; capital formation nudged up 0.6 percent versus 0.3 percent before and exports posted a 9.1-percent growth against a faster 13-percent expansion during the first quarter last year…The Philippines’ first-quarter growth is third highest in the region, next to China and Vietnam.In the punditocracy, my column for today is A history of the House.Oscar Lagman in his BusinessWorld column (unavailable online), compares Fr. Panlilio’s victory to similar revolts by the middle and upper classes in the 1950s and 1960s:In 1959, the residents of Quezon City, exasperated at the poor performance of those running the city government, organized the Citizens League for Good Government which subsequently fielded a full slate of candidates, from mayor to councilors, in the elections of that year….  Incidentally, in addition to the above, and ask asked in a comment by Gus Lagman, the QC citizen’s league was also composed of veteran politicians like former Senator Proceso Sebastian; but they were up against the machinery of mayor Amoranto, who had introduced the squatter vote into Quezon City -the squatter vote serves as an antidote to whatever votes middle class reformists can put together; not to mention the fact that the candidates of the league were generally elderly individuals while Charlie Albert died young.He also urges Randy David to provide counsel to the new Pampanga governor:Among Ed first urged Randy David to run for governor of Pampanga.

Thursday and Friday market action was primarily from people who missed the 20-percent increase of stock prices in 2007 who suddenly jumped on board the train that left the station in July 2006.The most amazing quote I read about the market/economy was this: “The market’s upbeat on higher-than-expected GDP growth that may translate to robust corporate earnings growth in the next few quarters.”I will not embarrass the person who said this by naming him or her….  I’ve gone into my criticism of the credit-grabbing instincts of the President often enough but it bears repeating: what irks me is credit gets grabbed by the administration for the things it’s not responsible for, while ignoring the things it’s definitely responsible for -and not doing enough in, such as customs, the BIR, not wasting government resources on boondoggles like Cha-Cha, etc. And the foreign observers in the know have been saying they know the real score, though of course they say so in bureaucratese.But time and again, there’s the shrill bellowing of those who complain that come on, some credit must be due the President?…  Much as these policies will cause trouble with environmental groups, advocates of tribal minorities, the NPA (who will be edged out from places where mining takes place, as firms beef up their security), it’s really tough, I think, to argue against it: the wealth is there; and it’s not a very convincing option to say, keep the wealth underground in the name of glorious Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought (which is only waiting to go into mining once its side wins) or for the Greater Glory of a God whose altars and chalices are made of gold from the ground.

And it’s not.Which goes to show, he said, that OFW money is going into buying property, hence the boom in construction, and thus, the attractiveness of property companies….  If you visit the Philippine Stock Exchange website, you’ll see the biggest gainers are in Holding Firms (up 2.2568%), Property (2.2663%), and Services (3.0865%), with Services being the biggest gainer for May 31, 2007.  If you look at the list of Active Stocks, you’ll see that Property is top of the heap; the list of Top Gainers (APR, PEP, CEU, etc.) is interesting when compared to the Top Losers (LFM, BKD, SFI).