Gerardo Sicat
Economist
Gerardo Sicat was born in San Fernando, Pampanga on October 7, 1935. His parents were poor but hardworking. His father finished only the first year of high school and his mother only the lowest primary grade. They brought up a family of eight children to a fulfilling full education up to college. He was second-born and would reach the highest educational distinction among his siblings on his own hard work and turn of good luck. He would study only in Philippine public schools up to his graduate education in the University of the Philippines. Awarded a generous Rockefeller Foundation scholarship in support of the faculty development program of the U,P. School of Economics in 1959, he finished his doctorate in economics studies in record time at the famed Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1963.
When he was 6 years old, his father moved the whole family to Manila where he grew up. The war delayed his schooling though he spent one year in grade school. His postwar schooling was entirely in the Greater Manila area: elementary schooling in Mabini Elementary School, high school in the Arellano High School where he graduated in 1953, and the University of the Philippines (UP). He initially enrolled in the pre-medical program of the University of the Philippines. Even while doing well in his studies, he underwent a personal reassessment of his life course during his sophomore year. Calculating personal and family circumstances, he moved toward the study of the social sciences, history, politics and economics – through his shift of his studies to the undergraduate foreign service curriculum of the university.
He graduated with two bachelor’s degrees, B.S.F.S. (1957) and A.B. (1958), both degrees with cum laude. He continued his studies in 1957 in the economics graduate program and earned the M.A. from the University of the Philippines in 1958. His UP studies was for a period of five years, from 1953 to 1958.
Dr. Gerardo P. Sicat is a Filipino economist whose career spans teaching and research, government service in the highest councils of economic policy making, and international economic work as a development practitioner. He is known for his advocacy of market economic principles for Philippine development. This arose out of the peculiar circumstance of his country’s tendency to adopt restrictive economic measures that stifles its own development potential.
His career as an economist began in 1958 on the faculty of the University of the Philippines. A year later, he spent the next three years and a half at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the great centers for the learning of economics, where he obtained his doctorate degree in 1963. Returning home as Assistant Professor of Economics and resuming his teaching job at the U.P. in 1963, he quickly rose in the academic ranks to become full Professor of Economics for his studies on the on the Philippine economy and his growing responsibilities at the newly created School of Economics.
In 1970, this academic career was interrupted by the call of government to join the cabinet. He became the nation’s economic planner when he assumed the position of Chairman of the National Economic Council. The planning agencies were reorganized in 1973. He was appointed to become the first head of the new national planning agency, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA). As Director General of NEDA, he reorganized the government planning machinery and made it into a more effective agency that had over-reaching impact on the whole government’s development program.
As an economic policy maker in government, he was appalled by the heavily protectionist thinking in economic matters that dominated government officials even at the highest councils of government. This was true even as he worked with the one of the best groups of policy makers ever assembled by any Philippine president.
Disappointed by the heavily protectionist economic thinking in his country especially, he founded the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) and helped to strengthen the social sciences organization of the country, the Philippine Social Sciences Council. Further, he helped to make the University of the Philippines School of Economics the premier school in Economics in the nation and a national resource for economic policy making. He did this by funneling research resources and by creating the Philippine Center for Economic Development (PCED), as a financial arm for its research and training activities.
His studies helped to make the liberalization of trade and industry in the country possible. To complement his activities on the policy front, he worked hard to develop teachable materials for Philippine economic education. In 1983, he wrote the major textbook on Economics in the Philippines. The late Australian economist, Professor Heinz Arndt, an expert on Asian economic development, referred to this work as “the first in Asia to prepare a comprehensive textbook with a focus on the problems of developing economies and written for students of developing countries.”
Wikipedia
Economist
Gerardo Sicat was born in San Fernando, Pampanga on October 7, 1935. His parents were poor but hardworking. His father finished only the first year of high school and his mother only the lowest primary grade. They brought up a family of eight children to a fulfilling full education up to college. He was second-born and would reach the highest educational distinction among his siblings on his own hard work and turn of good luck. He would study only in Philippine public schools up to his graduate education in the University of the Philippines. Awarded a generous Rockefeller Foundation scholarship in support of the faculty development program of the U,P. School of Economics in 1959, he finished his doctorate in economics studies in record time at the famed Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1963.
When he was 6 years old, his father moved the whole family to Manila where he grew up. The war delayed his schooling though he spent one year in grade school. His postwar schooling was entirely in the Greater Manila area: elementary schooling in Mabini Elementary School, high school in the Arellano High School where he graduated in 1953, and the University of the Philippines (UP). He initially enrolled in the pre-medical program of the University of the Philippines. Even while doing well in his studies, he underwent a personal reassessment of his life course during his sophomore year. Calculating personal and family circumstances, he moved toward the study of the social sciences, history, politics and economics – through his shift of his studies to the undergraduate foreign service curriculum of the university.
He graduated with two bachelor’s degrees, B.S.F.S. (1957) and A.B. (1958), both degrees with cum laude. He continued his studies in 1957 in the economics graduate program and earned the M.A. from the University of the Philippines in 1958. His UP studies was for a period of five years, from 1953 to 1958.
Dr. Gerardo P. Sicat is a Filipino economist whose career spans teaching and research, government service in the highest councils of economic policy making, and international economic work as a development practitioner. He is known for his advocacy of market economic principles for Philippine development. This arose out of the peculiar circumstance of his country’s tendency to adopt restrictive economic measures that stifles its own development potential.
His career as an economist began in 1958 on the faculty of the University of the Philippines. A year later, he spent the next three years and a half at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the great centers for the learning of economics, where he obtained his doctorate degree in 1963. Returning home as Assistant Professor of Economics and resuming his teaching job at the U.P. in 1963, he quickly rose in the academic ranks to become full Professor of Economics for his studies on the on the Philippine economy and his growing responsibilities at the newly created School of Economics.
In 1970, this academic career was interrupted by the call of government to join the cabinet. He became the nation’s economic planner when he assumed the position of Chairman of the National Economic Council. The planning agencies were reorganized in 1973. He was appointed to become the first head of the new national planning agency, the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA). As Director General of NEDA, he reorganized the government planning machinery and made it into a more effective agency that had over-reaching impact on the whole government’s development program.
As an economic policy maker in government, he was appalled by the heavily protectionist thinking in economic matters that dominated government officials even at the highest councils of government. This was true even as he worked with the one of the best groups of policy makers ever assembled by any Philippine president.
Disappointed by the heavily protectionist economic thinking in his country especially, he founded the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) and helped to strengthen the social sciences organization of the country, the Philippine Social Sciences Council. Further, he helped to make the University of the Philippines School of Economics the premier school in Economics in the nation and a national resource for economic policy making. He did this by funneling research resources and by creating the Philippine Center for Economic Development (PCED), as a financial arm for its research and training activities.
His studies helped to make the liberalization of trade and industry in the country possible. To complement his activities on the policy front, he worked hard to develop teachable materials for Philippine economic education. In 1983, he wrote the major textbook on Economics in the Philippines. The late Australian economist, Professor Heinz Arndt, an expert on Asian economic development, referred to this work as “the first in Asia to prepare a comprehensive textbook with a focus on the problems of developing economies and written for students of developing countries.”
Wikipedia
