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グローバル人材育成の道｜海野惠一（元アクセンチュア代表）2017年08月21日
フィリピンの大統領の滑稽なアイデアは経済に害を与えていない。 雇用と投資ではRodrigo Duterteは破壊者というよりかは改革者だ。
The Philippine president’s zany ideas have not hurt the economy
When it comes to jobs and investment, Rodrigo Duterte is more reformer than wrecker
Aug 16th 2017 | MANILA
フィリピンの大統領の滑稽なアイデアは経済に害を与えていない。
雇用と投資ではRodrigo Duterteは破壊者というよりかは改革者だ。
zany：滑稽な
wrecker：破壊する人
IN MATTERS of economics, as in other realms, Rodrigo Duterte, the president of the Philippines, is more than capable of flamboyant, populist gestures. Earlier this month, to the astonishment and consternation of much of his cabinet, he signed a law abolishing tuition fees for students in state universities. When asked how the government would pay for the new policy, he replied “I don’t know, we’ll have to see.” By the same token, he has promised to restrict severely the sorts of temporary contracts under which around 30% of Filipinos are employed; he has pledged allegiance to China in exchange for investment in infrastructure; and, in April, he announced a plan to suspend imports of rice to help local farmers.
flamboyant：自身に満ちて大胆な
gestures：意思表示
consternation：驚愕したことには
allegiance：忠誠を誓う
Economists point out that abolishing university tuition will be more of a subsidy for the rich than the poor, since just 12% of students come from the poorest 20% of families. It could also cost anywhere between 30bn pesos ($588m) and 100bn pesos a year, according to different politicians. And it is causing alarm at private institutions, which fear a sudden slump in enrolment. But most of Mr Duterte’s radical economic policies get watered down or shelved by his underlings before they cause such upheaval, explains Filomeno Santa Ana of Action for Economic Reforms, a think-tank: “The economic managers usually neutralise the president’s populism.” For all the big talk, economic policy during Mr Duterte’s first year in office has been surprisingly sober.
watered：骨抜きにする
shelved：棚上げにする
underlings：下っ端
upheaval：大変動
neutralise：無効にする
sober：地味な
The Philippine economy is one of the peppiest in South-East Asia. Last year it expanded by 6.8%, overtaking those of Singapore and Malaysia in size. The World Bank expects it to grow at a similar pace this year and next. A large, youthful population at ease with the English language—a legacy, in part, of American colonialism—is a spur to growth. Filipinos working abroad as maids, nurses and waiters, among many other jobs, send back about $31bn a year—equivalent to more than 10% of GDP. Manila’s skyline, daubed with shiny new apartment buildings, shows where much of the money goes.
peppiest：元気な
at ease：気楽で
daubed：塗る
Western firms also outsource vast amounts of office drudgery to the Philippines. The country is a bigger player than India in call centres; its largest private employer, Convergys, an American telecoms firm, has 63,000 Filipinos on its lines. Others elsewhere have the unpleasant task of checking sites such as YouTube and Facebook for vile content, flagging videos of beheadings and orgies. In the past 15 years the industry of “business process outsourcing” has grown from nothing to about 9% of GDP.
drudgery：退屈な骨折り仕事
vile：下劣な
flagging：警告を与える
orgies：度の過ぎた行為
The cabinet and bureaucracy have so far dissuaded Mr Duterte from rocking the boat too much. When he said he would suspend imports of rice, officials at the National Food Authority, which is charged with ensuring an adequate supply of staples and with keeping prices stable, pointed out that all Filipinos eat rice, but relatively few grow it, so curbs on imports would hurt more people than they helped. In the end, Mr Duterte simply changed the rules on imports to reduce the role of the state. Similarly, the government’s labour-market reforms have been much less radical than originally promised, targeting only the most blatant abuses of short-term contracts. And the talk of aligning the Philippines with China has produced little tangible change so far—as well as little of the promised investment, alas.
dissuaded：説得して〜を思いとどまらせる
rocking the boat：事を荒立てる
staples：必需食品
blatant：露骨な
The goal on which the president and his more level-headed lieutenants seem to agree is tax reform, to pay for investment in infrastructure. Many businessmen and workers spend hours sitting in Manila’s traffic jams each day instead of making money. One banker says that when foreign investors come to town, she parks them in posh hotels and has local bosses visit in carousel to prevent the visitors squandering time and goodwill in traffic. Poor roads and rundown airports elsewhere in the archipelago present similar problems. Mr Duterte wants to increase spending on infrastructure from 5.2% of GDP last year to 7.4% of GDP in 2022 to sort things out. His plans include a new railway in Mindanao, a troubled southern island blighted by insurgencies, and the revamping of Clark airport, to the north of Manila.
level-headed：良識のある
lieutenant：副官
parks ：一時的に預ける
posh：豪華な
carousel：荷物引き渡し場のコンベア 飛行場のホテルに泊まらせるという意味
squandering：浪費する
rundown：荒れ放題の
blighted：破壊する
revamping：修繕する
Carlos Dominguez, the finance minister, has already raised the budget deficit from 2% of GDP to 3%, to support such investments. In the longer run, extra funds will come from a package of tax-reform bills, which is supposed to raise 375bn pesos a year by 2020. The first bill was passed by the lower house of Congress in May; the upper house is expected to follow suit by the end of the year. It raises the threshold at which Filipinos will have to pay income tax to 250,000 pesos a year, letting four-fifths of them off the hook altogether.
follow suit：先例に倣う
off the hook ：大目に見てやる
１ペソ＝２．１円
But the rate for those earning 5m pesos or more will rise from 30% to 35%. Taxes on vehicles and fuel are to rise too—a squeeze on richer Filipinos, given that fewer than one in ten owns a car. Taxes may also go up on alcohol, cigarettes and sugary drinks. The second bill would shrink the corporate-tax rate from 30% (high for the region) to 25%, while closing expensive loopholes. The third will focus on property taxes and the fourth on capital income, mining and perhaps junk food.
squeeze：圧迫・引き締め
Mr Duterte’s political star power should speed the passage of these reforms. But his unpredictability makes politicians, executives and investors wary. The peso is among the few currencies in the region to have weakened since the beginning of the year, partly because of the growing budget deficit and weakening current-account balance. Neither an ardent reformer nor a populist lunatic economically, the president inherited a prospering country. Almost a year later, the Philippines is still one. This suggests that for all his damn-the-torpedoes rhetoric, Mr Duterte occasionally also listens.
passage：経過・発展
unpredictability：予測できないこと
lunatic：キチガイじみた
occasionally：時々
ドゥテルテ大統領が突飛な指示を出すが、優秀な官僚がそれなりに修正して変更しているのでうまく行っている。国立大学の授業料を無料にすると言ったことに対してはその予算の目当てはない。インフラがだめなので、その予算を増額する。必需品の供給を確保すると同時に贅沢品の税金をあげる。彼の言うことは大げさで突飛だが、まともなことを言っている。トランプとはだいぶ違うようだ。
火曜日。ではまた明日。
When it comes to jobs and investment, Rodrigo Duterte is more reformer than wrecker
Aug 16th 2017 | MANILA
フィリピンの大統領の滑稽なアイデアは経済に害を与えていない。
雇用と投資ではRodrigo Duterteは破壊者というよりかは改革者だ。
zany：滑稽な
wrecker：破壊する人
IN MATTERS of economics, as in other realms, Rodrigo Duterte, the president of the Philippines, is more than capable of flamboyant, populist gestures. Earlier this month, to the astonishment and consternation of much of his cabinet, he signed a law abolishing tuition fees for students in state universities. When asked how the government would pay for the new policy, he replied “I don’t know, we’ll have to see.” By the same token, he has promised to restrict severely the sorts of temporary contracts under which around 30% of Filipinos are employed; he has pledged allegiance to China in exchange for investment in infrastructure; and, in April, he announced a plan to suspend imports of rice to help local farmers.
flamboyant：自身に満ちて大胆な
gestures：意思表示
consternation：驚愕したことには
allegiance：忠誠を誓う
Economists point out that abolishing university tuition will be more of a subsidy for the rich than the poor, since just 12% of students come from the poorest 20% of families. It could also cost anywhere between 30bn pesos ($588m) and 100bn pesos a year, according to different politicians. And it is causing alarm at private institutions, which fear a sudden slump in enrolment. But most of Mr Duterte’s radical economic policies get watered down or shelved by his underlings before they cause such upheaval, explains Filomeno Santa Ana of Action for Economic Reforms, a think-tank: “The economic managers usually neutralise the president’s populism.” For all the big talk, economic policy during Mr Duterte’s first year in office has been surprisingly sober.
watered：骨抜きにする
shelved：棚上げにする
underlings：下っ端
upheaval：大変動
neutralise：無効にする
sober：地味な
The Philippine economy is one of the peppiest in South-East Asia. Last year it expanded by 6.8%, overtaking those of Singapore and Malaysia in size. The World Bank expects it to grow at a similar pace this year and next. A large, youthful population at ease with the English language—a legacy, in part, of American colonialism—is a spur to growth. Filipinos working abroad as maids, nurses and waiters, among many other jobs, send back about $31bn a year—equivalent to more than 10% of GDP. Manila’s skyline, daubed with shiny new apartment buildings, shows where much of the money goes.
peppiest：元気な
at ease：気楽で
daubed：塗る
Western firms also outsource vast amounts of office drudgery to the Philippines. The country is a bigger player than India in call centres; its largest private employer, Convergys, an American telecoms firm, has 63,000 Filipinos on its lines. Others elsewhere have the unpleasant task of checking sites such as YouTube and Facebook for vile content, flagging videos of beheadings and orgies. In the past 15 years the industry of “business process outsourcing” has grown from nothing to about 9% of GDP.
drudgery：退屈な骨折り仕事
vile：下劣な
flagging：警告を与える
orgies：度の過ぎた行為
The cabinet and bureaucracy have so far dissuaded Mr Duterte from rocking the boat too much. When he said he would suspend imports of rice, officials at the National Food Authority, which is charged with ensuring an adequate supply of staples and with keeping prices stable, pointed out that all Filipinos eat rice, but relatively few grow it, so curbs on imports would hurt more people than they helped. In the end, Mr Duterte simply changed the rules on imports to reduce the role of the state. Similarly, the government’s labour-market reforms have been much less radical than originally promised, targeting only the most blatant abuses of short-term contracts. And the talk of aligning the Philippines with China has produced little tangible change so far—as well as little of the promised investment, alas.
dissuaded：説得して〜を思いとどまらせる
rocking the boat：事を荒立てる
staples：必需食品
blatant：露骨な
The goal on which the president and his more level-headed lieutenants seem to agree is tax reform, to pay for investment in infrastructure. Many businessmen and workers spend hours sitting in Manila’s traffic jams each day instead of making money. One banker says that when foreign investors come to town, she parks them in posh hotels and has local bosses visit in carousel to prevent the visitors squandering time and goodwill in traffic. Poor roads and rundown airports elsewhere in the archipelago present similar problems. Mr Duterte wants to increase spending on infrastructure from 5.2% of GDP last year to 7.4% of GDP in 2022 to sort things out. His plans include a new railway in Mindanao, a troubled southern island blighted by insurgencies, and the revamping of Clark airport, to the north of Manila.
level-headed：良識のある
lieutenant：副官
parks ：一時的に預ける
posh：豪華な
carousel：荷物引き渡し場のコンベア 飛行場のホテルに泊まらせるという意味
squandering：浪費する
rundown：荒れ放題の
blighted：破壊する
revamping：修繕する
Carlos Dominguez, the finance minister, has already raised the budget deficit from 2% of GDP to 3%, to support such investments. In the longer run, extra funds will come from a package of tax-reform bills, which is supposed to raise 375bn pesos a year by 2020. The first bill was passed by the lower house of Congress in May; the upper house is expected to follow suit by the end of the year. It raises the threshold at which Filipinos will have to pay income tax to 250,000 pesos a year, letting four-fifths of them off the hook altogether.
follow suit：先例に倣う
off the hook ：大目に見てやる
１ペソ＝２．１円
But the rate for those earning 5m pesos or more will rise from 30% to 35%. Taxes on vehicles and fuel are to rise too—a squeeze on richer Filipinos, given that fewer than one in ten owns a car. Taxes may also go up on alcohol, cigarettes and sugary drinks. The second bill would shrink the corporate-tax rate from 30% (high for the region) to 25%, while closing expensive loopholes. The third will focus on property taxes and the fourth on capital income, mining and perhaps junk food.
squeeze：圧迫・引き締め
Mr Duterte’s political star power should speed the passage of these reforms. But his unpredictability makes politicians, executives and investors wary. The peso is among the few currencies in the region to have weakened since the beginning of the year, partly because of the growing budget deficit and weakening current-account balance. Neither an ardent reformer nor a populist lunatic economically, the president inherited a prospering country. Almost a year later, the Philippines is still one. This suggests that for all his damn-the-torpedoes rhetoric, Mr Duterte occasionally also listens.
passage：経過・発展
unpredictability：予測できないこと
lunatic：キチガイじみた
occasionally：時々
ドゥテルテ大統領が突飛な指示を出すが、優秀な官僚がそれなりに修正して変更しているのでうまく行っている。国立大学の授業料を無料にすると言ったことに対してはその予算の目当てはない。インフラがだめなので、その予算を増額する。必需品の供給を確保すると同時に贅沢品の税金をあげる。彼の言うことは大げさで突飛だが、まともなことを言っている。トランプとはだいぶ違うようだ。
火曜日。ではまた明日。
