The current slump is being worsened by the most serious financial crisis to hit the country since the 1930s.
Long one of Asia's economic basket cases, the Philippines' dire poverty is being worsened by recession and huge wealth disparities.
The glut of unsold homes is being worsened by soaring mortgage foreclosures, which are dumping even more properties on the market.
Labour says the crisis is being worsened by record numbers of teachers leaving the profession, with 50,000 quitting this year alone – more than those who joined – and worse may be to come.
The labor shortages are being worsened by an economic boom and improving job prospects in inland provinces that have long supplied a steady stream of migrant workers to industrial areas.
Illegal fishing also has a hand in driving already threatened species closer to extinction like the critically-endangered vaquita, the world's smallest porpoise, whose fate is rapidly being worsened by illegal fishers in Mexico who tangle and drown the small, protected mammals in their gill nets.
