Moronic Holidays in RP

Whoever came up with that stupid suggestion to extend the looong holidays in the Philippines is a moron. If that moronic adviser of Philippine ill president Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo gave as a reason that oft-repeated line of "holiday economics", he or she failed in his economics class.

For an economy to avoid getting into the recession groove, it needs to always charge and heat up. In our case, our government want this economy to really slow down. With a very long holiday, the economy is in trouble. If government intends to actually increase consumer spending, this is a wrong way to do it because people are not going to spend a ton of money during this long holiday. Many especially working in both the informal and formal sectors are daily wage workers. Other companies also have a policy of "no work, no pay". So, these people stand to lose about 11 days of pay or about 5 to 6,000 pesos. Besides, many companies failed to give holiday pay and even struggled to find 13th month pays. So, how would people spend more these holidays?

Since government is also on a holiday mode, many people stand to lose a lot of opportunity. For example, those who want to renew their passports, or those who is expecting to sign a new employment contract (like moi)---they all have to do it only on January 5, 2009. By that time, they would have lost considerable opportunities. This also applies to those who need to transact with local government units or the POEA or other government agencies, like the SEC.

I hate to be a killjoy, but I propose the following:

1. Government should at least form a working service unit in every government department during this long holiday. Okey, just allow workers from private companies to have their own long holidays, but it would be best if government opens up starting on the 29th of December, even if on that day only. That would give the best impression to the people that this government is not tamad.

2. Government should make 31 a half-day and January 2, 2009 a working day. Why? If government declares even 2 January 2009 a holiday, we have lost already at least 4 days worth of production which, under the current economic crisis, means millions of pesos worth of productive time lost!

It is time for government to realize that to save us from an impending economic crisis, we need to work harder and by that means more time to produce, more time to spend working not more time to procrastinate and take a vacation. Only morons take long holidays.