A simultaneous increase in demand for oil on the part of China and wave of worry over the state of the US dollar resulted in the price of oil rising and the value of the dollar falling on Friday. For the most part, the rise in the price of oil comes off the back of the softening of the dollar.
Since oil is traded in dollars around the world, the value of the dollar and the price of oil are intertwined. The dollar continues to buckle under the burden of a huge load of debt and it suffers from analysts’ doubt …read more

Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs), remitting part of their dollar earnings to support their families in the Philippines, have become a significant factor in the Philippine Economy (US$ 14 billion in 2007).
Remittances have not been only for consumption expenditures (i.e., monthly household expenses) , but also for investments in housing and real estate. As a matter of fact, big real estate companies and banks in house financing have set up offices in the cities where OFWs are clustered (e.g., San Francisco & Los Angeles, Chicago, Hongkong, Singapore, Rome, etc).

As the job situation of OFWs are unstable (longest employment contracts …read more

Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs), remitting part of their dollar earnings to support their families in the Philippines, have become a significant factor in the Philippine Economy (US$ 14 billion in 2007).
The weakening of the US$ has hit the OFWs with a double whammy.

Not only do they have to remit a greater portion of their dollar earnings (US$ 1 = PhP 52 three years ago, US$ 1 = PhP 41 today) to maintain the level of support for their families in the Philippines, their living expenses in the countries where they work have also increased. With companies downsizing, there is …read more

The US Census Bureau puts Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) in the US at 2,807,731 in 2005. The US State Department estimates Americans of Filipino ancestry at 4 million.
Wikipedia estimates OFWs worldwide at 10 million (which is about 11% of the Philippine population and about one-third of the Philippine labor force).
In 2007 alone, the Philippine Department of Labor & Employment reported 1,012,954 left the Philippines to find employment abroad. It also reported that OFWs worldwide remitted US$ 14 billion to their families in the Philippines.

Clearly, OFWs and their remittances are a significant slice in the Philippine economic …read more