A recently filed bill by Sen. Panfilo Lacson seeks to make adult children legally obligated to support their elderly parents — with penalties including fines or even jail time for those who fail to provide.
At first glance, the bill seems noble: protect the elderly, uphold family values. But behind its surface lies a flawed, dangerous assumption — that children exist to repay a debt they never asked to owe.
Let us be clear: we believe in caring for our elders. But care should come from love and choice — not legislation. The proposed bill is not about protecting the elderly; it’s about shifting the burden of a broken system onto the backs of a generation already crushed by poverty, debt, and economic insecurity.
In today’s reality, many Filipino youth are already breadwinners, juggling multiple jobs, supporting siblings, and barely surviving in a system that offers low wages, high inflation, and unstable job markets. Forcing them to financially support aging parents — many of whom may have been absent, abusive, or emotionally neglectful — is not just unfair. It’s cruel.
What happens when the relationship was toxic? When there was no emotional or financial support given during childhood? When the child was abandoned, disowned, or used as an investment? This bill provides no exemptions for estrangement, no protections for survivors of abuse. It assumes all parents are deserving, and all children are selfish if they don’t comply.
This law will not create love — it will legislate guilt. It turns emotional obligation into a legal contract, where failing to meet financial expectations becomes punishable by law. It ignores the nuances of broken families, of absent fathers, of manipulative mothers, of children who were only ever called upon when they started earning.
Worse, it could push parents to treat their children as future investments — “puhunan ang anak” — raising them with the expectation of future returns. We already see this mindset normalized in families that pressure young people to sacrifice dreams for their elders’ comfort. This bill would legitimize that dangerous cycle.
Let’s be honest: this bill exists because our government has failed to provide sustainable elder care, universal healthcare, decent pensions, and retirement safety nets. Instead of fixing these gaps, the solution is to pass the responsibility to children — regardless of their own financial and emotional circumstances.
The Filipino family is strong — we take care of our own not because we’re told to, but because we want to. But laws like this one insult that spirit by turning love into duty and duty into punishment.
If we’re going to pass laws about family obligations, perhaps we should also legislate that parents must support their children until they finish college, or that parents must be emotionally and mentally fit to raise children in the first place. Why is the responsibility always one-way?
We cannot write laws assuming every family is healthy, loving, and whole. That’s not the Philippines we live in.
If we truly want to protect our elders, let’s look at:
- Strengthening public pension systems
- Improving healthcare access and elderly facilities
- Creating programs for mental health and aging support
- Ending the culture of forced sacrifice and generational guilt
We need systemic solutions — not another reason to blame struggling children for a problem they didn’t create.
Children are not retirement plans. Love cannot be forced by fines. And true support should be earned, not demanded.
