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In
other years, Christmas season started as early as the first
days of November. Even at the ending days of October, Christmas
songs were filling the air. Malls, supermarkets and even small
stores start decking out in their Christmas finery.
The
object is to create a holiday atmosphere to induce the people
to buy early. Avoid the Christmas rush, they say, buy now,
runs the message. However, it is not happening this year.
The
big stores may start but only them. This ploy would not affect
empty pockets. Though the pesos is rising vis a vis the US
dollar, the peso gain is directly proportional to the raise
in prices of essential commodities. Some of us find the situation
anomalous. The purchasing power of the pesos is supposed to
rise. However, the rise of prices outstrips the rise of the
peso.
When
the peso was 56 against a US dollar, the price of fancy rice
- is the Camia and Panda really imported? - was something
like P22 per kilo. Now when the peso is 42 against the dollar,
the price of these rice are pushing P30 per kilo. Where did
the peso gain go? The fishes in the Jagna market like the
GG and the bangsi or flying fish, which are rarely bought
in other places of the Philippines, are hitting more than
fifty pesos per kilo.
It
is sad to say that our economic gains, if one would call them
that, is artificial.
The
dollars come from the OFWs. Our population explosion made
up for the population shrinkage of the industrialized countries
and the backwardness of the people from oil producing countries.
As long as we keep exporting people, we can keep our economy
afloat.
However,
we cannot always depend upon dollar remittances. We must have
income of our own. The question with population explosion
is that we can hardly feed ourselves. We are rice growers.
We spend money for research to grow miracle rice. Then we
train Thais, Burmese and other South East Asian peoples so
we can import cheap rice from them.
The
ultimate danger is that if the peso reaches ten to a dollar,
a prospective OFW would think several times before going abroad.
Or if the goes abroad, he might think of bringing his family
along and staying there for good. It is relatively cheap earning
dollars and spending dollars there.
Though
the dollar inflow is steady, the outflow is also steady. Japanese
stereos will be belting out Christmas songs, Chinese Christmas
lights will be flickering on Christmas trees and outdoors.
We watch shows on Japanese TVs, ride around in Japanese cars
fueled by imported fossil fuel and talk to each other over
Swedish, Korean or. Japanese cellphones, Heck Mac, that is
what makes our Christmas merry. We feast on chicken today
and eat feathers tomorrow.
It
is still less than a month and a half until Christmas. Although
the people are not yet hyped to go into a Christmas shopping
spree because of the economic anomaly, they may be conditioned
in the long run. Pavlov was able to make his dog salivate
even without the presence of food by ringing a bell. However,
the food must inevitably follow so the conditioning would
not fade. There must be ways to make Christmas merry without
money. But how? When the open season for the maninoys and
maninays start, is it fashionable to hide?
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