Far Eastern University

Sampaloc, Metro Manila, Philippines

LABOR MIGRATION IN THE PHILIPPINES

In Partial Fulfillment
of the requirements
for GED0113

Submitted to:
Achilles Alfred Catahan Ferranco

Submitted by:
LEAÑO, Crisena Lyn A.
LIM, Danelle A.
MAGLENTE, Robelyn A.
MARI, Janelle Via Anne F.

October 2019
 INTRODUCTION

We [Filipinos] are now a quasi-wandering people, pilgrims or prospectors staking our

lives and futures all over the world - in the Middle East, Africa, Europe, North and South

America, Australia and all of Asia; in every nook and cranny of this seemingly

godforsaken earth.

E. San Juan, Jr., Beyond Postcolonial Theory

Labor migration has already begun even before the 1970s. The Philippines was a

territory under the United States and Filipinos have been migrating to the United States. On

December 20, 1906, it was the first time that Filipino workers have arrived to Hawaii and were

hired as plantation workers. In the later years, more Filipinos-- approximately 120,000-150,000

arrived in Hawaii. The turning point in Filipino immigration to the US and in the other settlement

countries came after the immigration reforms. In just two years, several Filipino workers were

led to migrate in Hawaii for the reason that the policy established by the United States was lifted

after the World War II whereby the number of immigration for Filipino workers was restricted to

50 per year (Wiley, 2012). The Philippines then rose to an important source of immigrants in

several countries. Based on data from the Commission on Filipinos Overseas, between 1981

and 2003, an average of 55,000 Filipinos left the country each year as permanent emigrants

(Asis, 2008).

Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) is a term that was officially adopted by the

administration of Fidel Ramos to give recognition to individuals that seek to travel and work

abroad for better opportunities for the needs of their families in the Philippines (Cosalan, 2010).

Wanting to have a better life and support families, many Filipinos choose to work overseas and
migrate. For many years, a huge population of FIlipinos have left their homes in search for jobs

overseas that would make them successful. They are not to blame for it if the Philippines does

not have enough job opportunities for everyone and wanting to earn more to financially support

their loved ones. The main reason as to why Filipinos are motivated on wanting to migrate is

highly because of economic in nature. The underlying basis for the location of work is mostly

where they can earn the most income. If only given more job opportunities locally, then they

would have chosen to stay with their families and loved ones. In anticipation of better economic

prospects, labour migration was conceived as a temporary measure to address pressing

unemployment and balance-of-payments problems. The Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs)

population is the largest component of the Filipino diaspora and much more spread out

geographically.

Having to migrate and changing the country of residence is common as a way of

survival, to improve the way of life and live in a better condition. There is no end to this as long

as the native country is suffering from inequality in this world (Millanovic, 2005, as cited by

​ s long as they do so will affect the well-being, specifically the labor

Bertoli, S., et. al., 2017). A

market, both their home country and the present residing country. In addition to that, Pritchett

(2006, ​as cited by ​Bertoli, S., et. al., 2017) has described the temporary acceptance of foreign

workers, not the permanent immigration, as a way of “breaking the gridlock” or normalizing the

congestion or labor across borders which gives way to relieve or reduce poverty and to minimize

the inequalities ​(Millanovic, 2005, as cited by ​Bertoli, S., et. al., 2017).

Majority of Filipinos are seeking for jobs and wanting to work but only few are employed.

A factor that contributes to this unemployment is not just the lack of job opportunities, but also

the lack of quality jobs. There is a high share of low-skilled and informal jobs. Inequality of

wages is high, wages do not rise whether there is a growth of labor productivity. Furthermore,
Filipinos might be employed but they suffer from improper treatment such as low salaries or low

wages. For instance, farmers are one of the least paid workers in the Philippines. An interview

by Kathleen A. Martin from ABS-CBN News to ​NSCB Secretary General Jose Ramon G. Albert

said that “"Farmers and fishermen are among the least paid workers in the Philippine economy

with an average daily wage and salary of P156.8 and P178.43, respectively in 2011.” This just

shows that even though the job is tough that requires physical labor and is based on a

productivity level, it doesn’t mean that higher productivity equals to higher salary. Philippines

need to create jobs that can cater and sustain to the needs of the Filipinos.

In the Philippines, leaders have addressed the unemployment for decades by imposing

local jobs which is one of the major problems in the country. Local jobs are not enough to

unravel the problem, thereby the government have persisted to create the labor migration

policies. The answer for the surplus labor of the Philippines has been always the labor migration

by the administration. This plays a significant role in the country’s economic development, in

which it allows the excess human resources be absorbed by the foreign economies while

benefiting from the workers’ remittances from abroad which has a big impact in the foreign

exchange (Lopez, 2010).

Philippine Statistics Authority (2019) states that during the period of April to September

2018, 96.2 percent of the Overseas Contract Workers (OCWs) out of the total Overseas Filipino

Workers (OFWs) engage in work with existing contract whereas the remaining 3.8 percent work

without a contract. In Saudi Arabia, which is considered as the top destination of OFWs as it

comprises 24.3 percent of total OFWs. The other destinations were United Arab Emirates which

consists of 15.7%, Hongkong 6.3%, Kuwait 5.7%, Taiwan 5.5%, and Qatar 5.2 percent.

Moreover, during the period of April to September 2018, 235.9 billion pesos was the estimated
total remittance by OFWs which includes cash sent home, cash brought home, and remittances

in kind that totals 169.4, 55.2, and 11.2 billion pesos respectively. The remittance of OFWs was

mostly sent through banks that comprises 52.8 percent, others are services of money transfer

(45%), and agencies or local offices (2%). Additionally, the total salary of OFWs may be the

source of remittances that were sent to their families respectively. This data is based on the

responses given by the respondents on the total cash remittances sent by OFWs to their

families during April to September 2018. Furthermore, on the reference period, the total cash

held by the family member also the goods and products and its imputed value sent by the

OFWs were all in the total remittance.

Overseas Filipino Workers and Immigrants contribute to the development of the

Philippines due to remittances. Remittances contribute to the country’s Gross Domestic Product

by 10%. Moreover, these remittances help stabilize Philippine peso against US dollar.

According to Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, (See Table 1 below) the Philippines has recovered

from a drop to the fastest growth in 9 months. Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) remittances

had a 7.5% increase in July from a year ago and 12.71% from June, respectively $2.401 Billion

a year ago and $2.290 Billion from June. The impact is welcoming since it boosted the country’s

Gross Domestic Product or GDP (Noble, 2019). Luz Noble asked for a comment about the

remittances by OFWS to UnionBank of the Philippines, Inc. Chief Economist Ruben Carlo O.

Asuncion and he responded, “More remittances inflow just means more domestic demand, and

increasing domestic demand induces more economic expansion.” Truly, exporting the nation’s

manpower and workforce gives boost to the country’s economy.

T​able 1. Overseas Filipinos’ (OF) Remittances - for the periods indicated. From

Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas

 In the perception of aiming success economically and socially, most of the Filipinos work

and live abroad. Factors which highly impacts the Filipinos to work abroad are namely the rapid

growth in population, unemployment and underemployment, and the disparities of low domestic

income and international wage (Cosalan, 2010). The problem arises due to the lack of job

opportunities available locally. This study aims to identify the reasons as to why Filipinos choose

to work overseas or migrate rather than staying in the Philippines. It will also identify the
advantages and disadvantages of the lack of job opportunities in the Philippines. Specifically, it

aims to answer the following:

1. What are the reasons Filipinos choose to work overseas or migrate?

2. What are the factors that causes unemployment in the Philippines?

3. What are the effects in the development of the country if they work overseas or

migrate?

The result of the study will hopefully aid the questions as to why Filipinos have to migrate

in order to live comfortably. Moreover, it is the hope of this study to raise awareness to everyone

that there are certain reasons why Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) chooses to work abroad

and it is not merely for shallow reasons. To raise consciousness to the people who are in a

position to look beyond these reasons and address these accordingly so that there will be no

more family that will be away from their loved ones. Furthermore, the study aims for government

actions to safeguard and give value to Overseas Filipinos Workers for they have contributed to

the development of their country in terms of boosting the economy’s GDP, it is also to know

what are the existing actions made by the government to protect OFWs and if these actions are

enough to protect them. Lastly, This research study may serve as reference for studies that may

be conducted. Future researchers may use this as a guide for their in-depth passion for

self-presentation research.

The study focused on the reasons why Filipinos migrate to other countries and how it

affects their own country. This also includes the effect of migration to the development of the

country, whether it helped to eliminate unemployment and poverty. The primary data used was

existing studies or research and scholarly articles from credible researchers who used credible

information that has been conducted within the geographical location of the Philippines. This

study will not disclose the amount of Overseas Filipino Workers salary. It is delimited for the
year 2018 to 2019, and will not include data and information other than the said years, as we

aimed to provide timely and relevant information.

METHODOLOGY

This section discusses the methodology that will be used in the study. It presents a

description of the methods of the research design, research locale, research instrument and

data gathering procedures and analysis.

I. Research Design

As stated by WebFinance (2015), research design is a detailed outline of how an

investigation or study will take place. It is considered the blueprint or framework of every study

to get the information needed. In this study, the researchers will be using Qualitative descriptive

research from a secondary type of data. Qualitative descriptive research, according to an article

of Pacific Rim International Journal of Nursing Research, is a comprehensive summarization, in

everyday terms, of specific events experienced by individuals or groups of individuals.

Furthermore, a qualitative descriptive approach needs to be the design of choice when a

straightforward description of a phenomenon is desired. The researchers will not conduct data

through surveys and interviews but will collect data through secondary sources instead.

Secondary research, as stated by OxbridgeEssays (2017) involves data that has been collected

by somebody else previously, this type of data is called “past data” and is usually accessible via

past researchers, government records, and various online and offline resources. Secondary

research also involves re-analysing, interpreting, or reviewing past data and the role of the

researcher is always to specify how this past data informs his or her current research
 II. Research Locale

This study will be conducted at Far Eastern University (FEU), Manila. Gathering data

specifically will be held at the Far Estern University’s Library - computer laboratory, where

researchers might have found the easiest accessibility from online sources, using secondary

data that will found online is less expensive and takes much less time than primary sources.

III. Research Instrument

Researchers will be gathering data and information through the use of an existing

research, study and scholarly articles found in an online resources that provide statistics about

the Total Numbers of OFWs in year 2018, percentage of OFWs in each top destinations and

data of remittance in terms of totality. These results are from the 2018 Survey on Overseas

Filipinos and researchers assures that data provided are from credible sources because it

came from online government records which is the official site of Philippine Statistics Authority

and was just updated last April 2019.

 REFERENCES

Asis, Maruja. (2008). How international migration can support development: a challenge for the

​ witzerland: International
Philippines. ​Migration and development: perspectives from the south. S

Organization for Migration.

Asis, Maruja. (2017). ​The Philippines: Beyond Labor Migration, Toward Development and

(Possibly) Return

https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/philippines-beyond-labor-migration-toward-development-

and-possibly-return

Bertoli, S., Fernández-Huertas Moraga, J., & Keita, S. (2017). The Elasticity of the Migrant

Labour Supply: Evidence from Temporary Filipino Migrants. ​Journal of Development Studies​,

53​(11), 1822–1834. ​https://doi.org/10.1080/00220388.2016.1219347

Cosalan, Shirley. (2010). Causes of international migration. ​Study on the overseas filipino

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Lopez, Christine. (2010). ​Unemployment and the OFW phenomenon: an evaluation of the
outward-oriented job generation policy of the Arroyo administration. Dspace repository.
Retrieved from ​http://dspace.cas.upm.edu.ph/xmlui/handle/123456789/338?show=full
Martin, Kathleen. (2013). ​Farmers, fishermen among lowest paid in PH.​ ABS-CBN News.
https://news.abs-cbn.com/business/04/12/13/farmers-fishermen-among-lowest-paid-ph
Noble, Luz. (2019). ​Remittances recover in July to grow fastest in nine months — BSP data

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ta/

Philippines Statistics Authority. (2019). ​Total number of OFWs estimated at 2.3 million (results

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N/A. (N/D). Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas. ​Overseas Filipinos’ (OF) Remittances Statistic 2019.

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