The Philippine Internet Congress may be set up as one option, thru the country's People's Initiative law, which allows changes in the constitution and other laws if voted upon by 12% of registered voters, or currently, some 7.2 million out of 60 million voters. If indeed such I-Congress gets set up, what should it do to slay the country's centuries-old poverty monster while addressing planet Earth's climate change problem as well? Here are critical laws I-Congress should pass to attain such ideals:
1) Personal Income Tax to Co-op Shares Law: Personal income tax due must be used to buy shares in mega co-ops of the taxpayer's choosing. Low-salary employees who are exempted from income taxation should allocate at least 10% of income towards purchase of mega co-op shares. Operationally, the Bureau of Internal Revenue will assign personal income tax collection functions to State and private banks provided said banks grant loans equivalent to ten years of borrowers' income tax rates. Loans are all for borrowers' purchase of their choice of mega co-op corporate shares, in effect enabling employee masses to partly own giant high-profit mega co-op corporate groups, receive quarterly dividends from them, and enjoy rises in value of their mega co-op capital shares during good times.
2) Half Corporate Income Tax to Co-op Shares Law: 50% of yearly corporate income tax due should buy mega co-op shares of the company's choosing. Targets: a) attract 1st World joint venture companies thru lowered tax rates and 'taxes that earn', b) 'force' top companies to assign their experts to mega co-ops and their corporate groups for risk-reduction, and c) immediately multiply the productive capability of mass investments thru their consequent mega co-ops' expanded capital.
3) Loans for Mass Entrepreneurship Law: All credit-worthy employees may borrow four months' salary from State banks every two years at low interest, 10-year term, 1 year grace period. The loans should be used solely towards the purchase of mega co-op capital shares of the beneficiary's choosing. Installment payments may be sourced out of dividend rewards to the shareholder.
All three laws' benefits can easily be visualized: a) Billions of pesos each year will be channeled towards mega co-op capital formation; b) A stock ownership culture will be developed among all employees, which means democratization of sources of wealth; c) Wealth gaps will narrow down thru employee masses' part ownership of giant mega co-op corporate groups that award dividends and whose market values rise as said groups expand and repay their massive loans; d) Billions of pesos in quarterly dividends will be channeled among employee masses whose co-op corporate groups sell worldwide thru ASEAN Festival Malls, Filipino expats' sideline marketing outfits worldwide, and other marketing outlets; e) Philippine employee masses will be enabled to invest in giant mega co-op corporate groups without 'sweating it out' over decades to accumulate capital funds; f) Large corporate groups will be formed at the outset as a consequence of top companies with 'names' (proven management capabilities) attracting smaller ones to form business consortia that are able to penetrate international markets; g) The mega co-ops will attract capable mega co-op organizers and managers in the form of the organizing companies' retired top level officers and specialists who will naturally be recommended by their former workmates; h) Top companies will be 'forced' to assign their experts to their mega co-ops as consultants to ensure good returns for their investments; i) The mega co-op 'name' will be enhanced among potential local and international investors as well as joint venture partners due to the presence of capable skills assigned by said top companies; j) Billions of dollars in capital and loans largely in the form of production equipment will 'flood' the Philippines thru mega co-op joint ventures and build-operate-transfer arrangements with 1st World companies and world climate change Funds; k) A culture of corporate 'intrapreneurship' shall be created among all Philippine companies as a way of creating jobs for the poor; l) Thousands of mega co-op clean and green corporate groups will form each year to help address global warming; m) Millions of good-paying jobs will be created for 60+ million Primary & Elementary level Philippine bottom poor, who shall then afford education and qualify for 'free' capital shares and entrepreneurship loans as described; n) masses of group-taught 'website auditors' will form among mega co-op employee-shareholders to sniff out any potential danger to their mega co-ops' and small businesses' viability and profit-making ability; o) Armies of world-class Filipino skills will be developed incident to mega co-ops' joint venture and build-operate-transfer arrangements with 1st World companies.
4) Mega Co-op Working Students Law: All mega co-ops must require Elementary level and College undergraduate employees to enroll in internet-enabled distance study schools that require five team inventions licensed to mega co-ops to qualify for College graduation. Invented technologies may qualify for State financing assistance towards prototyping and licensing to mega co-ops. Targets: a) enable over 60 million Elementary level bottom poor to acquire skills for job promotion and inventions, the latter to enable student teams to earn million-peso royalties out of their inventions; b) make the Philippines a leading producer of new products and technologies that sell in world markets, partly by adapting much of the world's over 25 million patented technologies to conquer niche and mainstream markets; c) help expand mega co-ops' world-scale sales thru introduction of new products that have near-zero competition in world markets; d) attract 1st World retiree skills in engineering and sciences towards 'sideline' teaching in Philippine distance study colleges even as they help form and manage mega co-op joint venture companies.
2) Half Corporate Income Tax to Co-op Shares Law: 50% of yearly corporate income tax due should buy mega co-op shares of the company's choosing. Targets: a) attract 1st World joint venture companies thru lowered tax rates and 'taxes that earn', b) 'force' top companies to assign their experts to mega co-ops and their corporate groups for risk-reduction, and c) immediately multiply the productive capability of mass investments thru their consequent mega co-ops' expanded capital.
3) Loans for Mass Entrepreneurship Law: All credit-worthy employees may borrow four months' salary from State banks every two years at low interest, 10-year term, 1 year grace period. The loans should be used solely towards the purchase of mega co-op capital shares of the beneficiary's choosing. Installment payments may be sourced out of dividend rewards to the shareholder.
All three laws' benefits can easily be visualized: a) Billions of pesos each year will be channeled towards mega co-op capital formation; b) A stock ownership culture will be developed among all employees, which means democratization of sources of wealth; c) Wealth gaps will narrow down thru employee masses' part ownership of giant mega co-op corporate groups that award dividends and whose market values rise as said groups expand and repay their massive loans; d) Billions of pesos in quarterly dividends will be channeled among employee masses whose co-op corporate groups sell worldwide thru ASEAN Festival Malls, Filipino expats' sideline marketing outfits worldwide, and other marketing outlets; e) Philippine employee masses will be enabled to invest in giant mega co-op corporate groups without 'sweating it out' over decades to accumulate capital funds; f) Large corporate groups will be formed at the outset as a consequence of top companies with 'names' (proven management capabilities) attracting smaller ones to form business consortia that are able to penetrate international markets; g) The mega co-ops will attract capable mega co-op organizers and managers in the form of the organizing companies' retired top level officers and specialists who will naturally be recommended by their former workmates; h) Top companies will be 'forced' to assign their experts to their mega co-ops as consultants to ensure good returns for their investments; i) The mega co-op 'name' will be enhanced among potential local and international investors as well as joint venture partners due to the presence of capable skills assigned by said top companies; j) Billions of dollars in capital and loans largely in the form of production equipment will 'flood' the Philippines thru mega co-op joint ventures and build-operate-transfer arrangements with 1st World companies and world climate change Funds; k) A culture of corporate 'intrapreneurship' shall be created among all Philippine companies as a way of creating jobs for the poor; l) Thousands of mega co-op clean and green corporate groups will form each year to help address global warming; m) Millions of good-paying jobs will be created for 60+ million Primary & Elementary level Philippine bottom poor, who shall then afford education and qualify for 'free' capital shares and entrepreneurship loans as described; n) masses of group-taught 'website auditors' will form among mega co-op employee-shareholders to sniff out any potential danger to their mega co-ops' and small businesses' viability and profit-making ability; o) Armies of world-class Filipino skills will be developed incident to mega co-ops' joint venture and build-operate-transfer arrangements with 1st World companies.
4) Mega Co-op Working Students Law: All mega co-ops must require Elementary level and College undergraduate employees to enroll in internet-enabled distance study schools that require five team inventions licensed to mega co-ops to qualify for College graduation. Invented technologies may qualify for State financing assistance towards prototyping and licensing to mega co-ops. Targets: a) enable over 60 million Elementary level bottom poor to acquire skills for job promotion and inventions, the latter to enable student teams to earn million-peso royalties out of their inventions; b) make the Philippines a leading producer of new products and technologies that sell in world markets, partly by adapting much of the world's over 25 million patented technologies to conquer niche and mainstream markets; c) help expand mega co-ops' world-scale sales thru introduction of new products that have near-zero competition in world markets; d) attract 1st World retiree skills in engineering and sciences towards 'sideline' teaching in Philippine distance study colleges even as they help form and manage mega co-op joint venture companies.
5) State-Business Research and Development Law: 10% of all State incomes and loans must buy shares in R&D equipment-for-hire companies managed by the country's scientific, engineering and professional associations. Said companies may also award research grants to deserving applicants, 'recoverable' thru shares out of licensor incomes. Targets: a) enable all Philippine companies, universities and Science colleges to set up R&D departments that endlessly invent new products and technologies at rates that approach US patent grants (some 250,000 inventions each year) which have been the major sources of 1st World wealth over centuries; b) enable Filipino companies to make improvements or derive new technologies out of invention patents that number over 25 million worldwide, and commercialize them for world markets thru licensing of technology adaptations to mega co-ops towards production of affordable but quality products for worldwide sales.
6) Filipino Expatriates' Mega Co-op Shares Purchase Law: 10% of Filipino expats' remittances must buy shares in mega co-ops of their own or their relatives choosing. Targets: a) channel a part of expat remittances (some $25 billion yearly) towards investments in mega co-ops instead of paying for unproductive luxury imports as usual; b) enable Filipino expats' families to own capital shares in mega co-op corporate groups, thus earn dividends and rises in market value of stocks they own; c) enable expats and their families to become familiar with the ways of large-scale business and to set up small-group businesses thru mega co-op contracting or supply; d) re-channel majority of Expat employment away from abuse-inviting housemaid and bottom-job positions towards posts in ASEAN Festival Malls worldwide or in Philippine mega co-op corporate groups.
7) Employees' Bank (EB) Law: 10% of all mega co-ops' capital and 5% of all State tax incomes and loan proceeds each year have to help capitalize a Philippine Employees' Bank. The public and world Aid and climate change Funds may buy shares as well. The EB should grant equipment and operational loans only to mega co-ops and their related joint venture businesses, and refrain from handling consumer loans. Priority lending should be for the clean and green anti-poverty projects described in this blog. Targets: a) channel part of trillion-peso EB profits towards employee masses who partly own mega co-ops; b) channel part of State tax and loan proceeds as well as part of world funds towards the narrowing of local wealth imbalances; c) channel billions of dollars in world Funds towards mega co-ops' clean and green business operations that yield good dividend and interest income; d) force local elites' banks to raise savings and time deposit interest rates from near zero and 5% yearly versus their lending rates at 48% or so yearly, a practice that enables traditional banks to perpetuate themselves as wealth-gap creating machines.
Passed and promulgated in the Philippines and copied by other 3rd World nations, such laws should greatly help in enabling some five billion of the world's poor to redeem themselves with 1st World help while involving almost all of humanity in climate change action.
Passed and promulgated in the Philippines and copied by other 3rd World nations, such laws should greatly help in enabling some five billion of the world's poor to redeem themselves with 1st World help while involving almost all of humanity in climate change action.
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