There are two ways to look at the data in the table: (a) as absolute values and (b) as relative terms for the present and future values with selected peers.

RAED MORE

As absolute value, the annual population growth rate for Manila of 1.6% grants a reduction in the national rate through the period to 2025 from the present rate of 1.9% and is reasonable to me.

Historically, the metropolis grows faster than the country because of migration and my basis for assuming a relationship in growth between Manila and the Philippines.

The improvement can be attributed by cynics to the successful implementation of an RH law; personally, it may just be the consequence of a slowly, enriching urbanized society.

Sadly, McKinsey’s assumption of a 4.9% annual gross GDP rate improvement (for Manila) implies a reversion to the mean from the 7.3% of 2010 (ref the Philippines context) that was helped along by front-loaded election spending.

The 4.9% rate implies that McKinsey does not accept the success of any breaking through reform agenda to a higher growth rate plane like 7.0% that, to me, can only be sustained with structural change.

Hopefully this reform agenda is achieved by co-evolution that results into a more outward-looking and competitive local business elite.

Furthermore, that liberalization opens up the economy to fiercer domestic competition and frees the energy of a new horde of local entrepreneurs to invigorate all sectors of the economy.

In the relative sense , it is heartbreaking to accept that the credible McKinsey believes that the (national) conditions and political and business leadership in India, China, Indonesia and Vietnam will succeed in the next 15 years to develop and improve the welfare of its people better than our leadership in Manila and the Philippines.

Fifteen years is a short time; are we really condemned to such mediocrity within the Philippines are can anything be done to increase the pace of development?

Basic lessons even from Sun Tzu in improving Philippines performance
Can we in the Philippines achieve more than what McKinsey thinks is probable as of yesterday.

I have paraphrased the section below from James Clavell’s edition of The Art of War for each to contemplate the possibility:

How do cities and metropolis form and grow?

Cities form over time because people conclude that in a particular place they can come together and, because of benefit from being in one place, generate more welfare from higher productivity.

Thus, the higher cost of living and of property, say condominiums in high rise buildings, pay off by themselves from this inherent productivity of living together in crowded cities.

Jane Jacobs. Cities and the Wealth of Nations
1985 Vintage Books. Click image for Amazon link.

In the second of two-part post in July 2009, I did note that one view of countries by Jane Jacobs, a notable city activist, is that of Nations as Portfolios of Cities.
In 1985, Jacobs concluded that Manila is not a great city like Tokyo, Hongkong, Singapore or Los Angeles in that it is not able to cultivate and grow its own city region.

Today, I think her conclusion is still valid. Without its imperial role as the center of tax collection (and disbursement) nationally, I suspect Manila pales in that role without the advantage of being the Beltway compared to Cebu, Davao, Iloilo or even Urdaneta.

Even a quick visit to these four cities will show them colonizing the surrounding city regions via productive activities and creating supply chains with their hinterlands as per the Jacobs framework.

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She ascribes the power of these great cities to a complex dynamics among markets, jobs, transplants technology and capital.