During that time, however, the Philippine economy had gone into rapid decline because Marcos' debt driven deficit spending made the Philippines vulnerable when the United States increased its interest rates in the third quarter of 1981. The ensuing collapse of the Philippine economy, worsened by the political pressure after the assassination of Benigno Aquino, led to slow development of the Laiban dam project until Marcos was forced out of office and into exile by the 1986 People Power Revolution.