From their ivory towers to the surly bounds of earth

IF non-partisan economists were to rank the policy blunders of 2022, the undisputable top folly would be the decision to create the Maharlika Investment Fund (MIF), a draft law that was passed by the House of Representatives (HoR) before the year closed. It will definitely be rated as the "Top Policy Hoax" of the year. The powerful arguments against the MIF can be summed up this way: sold on hokum rather than policy empirics and economic rigor.

Finance Secretary Benjamin Diokno, the head of President Marcos Jr.'s economic team and main pitchman of the MIF, said in so many words that the MIF is an idea whose time has come. It was rolled out as the peak act that the country should undertake now (as if it were the most pressing issue of the time) to demonstrate the country's financial sophistication and maturity, the entry of the Philippines into the rarefied list of countries with sovereign wealth funds. Mr. Diokno desperately wanted to vest the administration of Mr. Marcos Jr. the bragging rights of being in the club of SWF investors, which in turn would boost Mr. Diokno's stock at the Palace.