Discussion Paper Series in Economics,
Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics

Abstract: During the late decades of the 20th and early decades of the 21th century East Asia experienced significant economic growth. However, the Philippines diverged due to slower growth rates. By establishing new and revised historical series for historical development of GDP in purchasing power parities along with productivity series, the paper concludes that almost lack of total productivity growth caused the bad performance of the Philippines. The reason for the inferior development seem to be dysfunctional political and managerial systems, with significant corruption and lack of investments in infrastructure. The system made foreign direct investments stay low until the last approximately 15 years, when the Philippine economy started a convergence process.

Keywords: Economic growth; Productivity; foreign direct investments; corruption; Asia; Philippines

JEL-codes: E01; E02; E60; N15; N45

Language: English

33 pages, August 4, 2025

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