Game in the Brain

– Not everyone is on the take. There are some idealists and far thinking pragmatists out there – far thinking pragmatists believe their intelligence and reputation has a higher pay-off than taking a cut.
– The higher up the chain of command you get into the project the less people you have to pay off. The lower level you are- which is the “proper way of doing it” the more you have to pay off.
– Any agenda or proposal someone will push on your behalf has a cost. Even if you have an awesome product. Having a great product jut reduces the cost of kickbacks and allows the clean ones to support you.
– Even a non-corrupt leader will have to please everyone, even the corrupt members. Especially IT projects, which are very easy to kill because when it comes to migration. It’s easy to waste time, plant blame, set things up to fail.
– Note that every awesome system, actually reduces the power from those it is supposed to help. Automation speeds things up, removes processes where gate keeps can extract a toll. It also makes the job of the bureaucrat harder having a system measure it and bringing the bureaucrat up to tech.
– Anecdotally, every IT project has kickback of up to 40-60%. Back in the early 2000s it was 80-90%. As long as someone is getting money – the vendor or official, someone will want a piece of that. Legally and especially illegally, people will want their cut.
-Revenue generating programs is the most demanded type of gov’t programs. It’s not that there is not enough money per govt department but it’s because as long someone is doing something for money, someone in the government will want its piece of it. But do note, these departments know they must offer something that adds value or else criticism will alert people to what their doing.

It would take a company to make an ERP and financial tracking system for the gov’t for free: let’s say the world bank were to fund an open source ERP and train all these people to use it. assuming world bank and UN ideal standards of transparency, a little bit more for the Philippine condition.

Actually given PNoys personality, there is a good chance he will push this, but he would need senate and congress to go along – and this will be killed there. The cost of migrating the entire system of the Philippines to an IT system is cheaper than ever before. The processing power to provide cheaper servers will go down sharply in the time it takes to implement the project.

Funny no open source system and well documented for such has been made. A well documented system, that is globally open and modular is like education – a common good that everyone can enjoy – private biz and citizens.

Believe me when I say I would make one if my family biz made enough disposable income for such. Then train a ton of people to customize it. Also it would have an online module builder to keep all modules available and open. I would work with accounting schools and training centers to make it that anyone can use it, live a transparent and hassle free life, and bring certainty and order to their work. I’ll also make it linux biased.