Marcos’ budget message: We are working for the people

President Marcos has just signed the General Appropriations Act (GAA) of 2024 that embodies the ₱5.768-trillion national budget next year. With the signing, we are assured that next year’s National Expenditure Program — anchored on the administration’s Medium-term Fiscal Framework (MTFF), the Eight-point Socioeconomic Agenda, and the Philippine Development Plan (PDP) 20232028 — will be pursued according to plan.

The ₱5.768-trillion national budget, the largest in the country’s history, will bankroll the government’s core battle plan in fighting poverty and combating illiteracy, producing food and ending hunger, protecting our homes and securing our borders, treating the sick and keeping our people healthy, creating jobs, and funding livelihoods. This battle plan is based on the government’s EightPoint Socioeconomic Agenda.

The MTFF, meanwhile, is a comprehensive plan aimed at sustaining the country's strong post-pandemic economic recovery and supporting accelerated growth, while the PDP 2023-2028 is a plan for deep economic and social transformation to reinvigorate job creation and accelerate poverty reduction by steering the economy back on a highgrowth path.

If everything goes as planned under the National Expenditure Program, the government is certain to attain its goals under the recently signed budget.

And to make sure that everything will work according to plan, President Marcos issued a clear statement to concerned government officials.

“We are working for the people, not for ourselves. We are working for the country, not for ourselves,” the President said at the signing of the 2024 national budget.

This is a fair warning to everyone.

In the implementation of projects under the government spending plan, there should be no room for complicity and lackadaisical approach. That is the underlying message of the President.

Now, crucial after the signing of the 2024 budget is how to fund the largest budget in the country’s history and execute the government spending plan.

Like in previous years, revenue collection is insufficient to cover the entire national budget and the government has to resort to debt to fill the void.

While the proposed 2024 budget was still being deliberated upon, the House of Representatives was told that tax revenue is projected to increase from ₱3.5 trillion in 2023 to ₱6.5 trillion in 2028, while non-tax revenues are expected to grow from ₱191 billion in 2023 to ₱184 billion in 2028. A ranking House official even said that the government will have to borrow ₱2.46 trillion to partly fund the 2024 budget.

This will be especially challenging to those charged to raise funds for the 2024 budget considering President Marcos’ message at the budget signing.

“We are curtailed by what we can collect, by what our tax coffers contain. We can be reckless — take the easy path, borrow, and let our children pick today's tab up tomorrow. But debt is not the kind of inheritance that we want those who will come after us," the President said. “Good fiscal stewardship imposes upon us discipline not to be led into the temptation of bloating what we owe. Good government dictates upon us the duty to spend the appropriations we have cobbled together for the correct purposes, the right way, on time, and on budget.”

Now, it’s up to them to become creative to meet President Marcos’ expectations. The bottomline is, government officials are working for the people not for themselves.