Happy 116th Independence day!
Last May 26, through the invitation of a Facebook friend, Casey Lartigue, I was able to attend a lecture in Seoul sponsored by Friedrich Naumann Foundation. It's about Freedom Barometer in Asia.
The main lesson I learned from that lecture is the realization that in contemporary discussion, freedom has three components: political freedom, rule of law, and economic freedom. It is also very enlightening for me to realize that there are already 10 variables to assess the freedom status of countries in Asia. Among 17 countries in Asia, Philippines is number 8. Not bad. Japan tops the list and North Korea is at the bottom.
However, my only regret is that among five variables in economic freedom, FNF dropped, which to me is the most important of all - access to sound money. Anyway, Philippines is not alone when it comes to unsound monetary policy. It is a feature common to all nations of the world.
In commemorating the 116th Independence Day of the Philippines, it is my prayer that increasing number of Filipinos will realize the connection between freedom and sound monetary policy. I think it is none other than our national hero himself who wrote that without economic freedom, independence is incomplete. And to me sound monetary policy is central to the substance of economic freedom. To understand what I mean by this, reading the articles written by Jorg Guido Hulsman and Thorstein Polleit is a good start.
I hope a day will come if not in my generation, at least in my children's generation that not only the Philippines, but many countries in the world could celebrate their own respective Independence Day under a sound monetary policy.
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