Statistics of personal economic wellbeing

The nationwide Social Weather Surveys include several core indicators of statuses and trends of personal economic wellbeing, all non-commissioned and published as a public service.  These are direct statistics of personal wellbeing, since the survey respondents are answering direct questions about the wellbeing of either themselves as individuals or of their families.

Statuses. The three basic SWS indicators of statuses of economic wellbeing are about (a) family-poverty, (b) family-hunger, and (c) adult joblessness.  In the first quarter of 2013, the self-rated poor were 52 percent of families, the hungry were 19 percent of families—with moderate (one-time/occasional) hunger at 15.7 percent and severe (frequent/persistent) hunger at 3.6 percent—and the jobless were 20 percent of adults.  (These numbers were first published on 4/24/2013, 5/2/2013, and 5/24/2013 respectively; see www.sws.org.ph.)

Incidentally, the government does not produce quarterly statistics on poverty or hunger.  I wish it would start doing so, and thus either validate or refute the SWS figures on economic deprivation (see my column “Syncing poverty and growth statistics,” 6/8/2013).  Lacking statistics on what truly matters, too many economists focus on fripperies like stock market prices instead.

What the government does have are quarterly statistics on “unemployment” (defined as not having worked in the week prior to its survey, and seeking work) and “underemployment” (defined as having worked in the said week, yet seeking more work).  The sum of the official unemployment and underemployment rates is usually well over 20 percent of the labor force, i.e., not far from the SWS measure of joblessness.

Statuses and trends are different things.  The status of an elevator means the floor it is on.  The trend of an elevator means whether it is on the way, up or on the way down, or at rest.  A trend can be obtained indirectly, by comparing the statuses of the separate time-points of two surveys.  The way to obtain it directly, at one point in time, is by asking a survey question about the perceived difference in statuses between two reference time-points.

Trends. The two basic SWS indicators of trends in economic wellbeing are about the direction of change in the respondent’s quality of life (“uri ng pamumuhay”) (a) as experienced at present compared to 12 months ago, and (b) as expected 12 months in the future, compared to the present. These are called, respectively, the “gainers versus losers” indicator and the “personal optimists versus pessimists” indicator. (The term “personal” distinguishes it from optimism versus pessimism about the future of “the economy.”)

The SWS trend indicators for the first quarter of 2013 were provided this week to BusinessWorld, and will be published imminently.  The net-gainers indicator continues to be in fair territory, as it has been over the past four quarters.

On the other hand, the personal optimists now number 39 percent of Filipinos, and personal pessimists now number 6 percent, raising net personal optimism to +32 (correctly rounded), which SWS classifies as Very High (at +30 or more).  It has been Very High five times, and High (+20 to +29) six times, in the 11 SWS surveys during President Noynoy Aquino’s term so far.

This is in contrast to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo’s time, when net personal optimism was Low (from -9 to zero) six times, Mediocre (from +1 to +9) 14 times, Fair (from +10 to +19) 14 times, and High only five times, in a total of 39 SWS surveys.  It reached Very High twice in the presidency of Cory Aquino, and also twice in that of Fidel Ramos, but not once in the presidencies of Joseph Estrada and Gloria Arroyo.

I particularly like the net personal optimism indicator, since it has proved very sensitive to economic conditions, not only over time but also across people.  A time-chart of net optimism by socioeconomic class is regularly included in every SWS report.  In this chart, it is the class ABCs, or middle-to-upper classes, whose optimism tends to spike up, and the class Es, the poorest to begin with, who tend to be least optimistic—foretelling a widening of the gap between rich and poor.

The better one’s past trend, the better one’s expected future trend. In the first quarter of 2013, those who said that their quality of life (QOL) improved had a net personal optimism score of +52.  Those who said their QOL was unchanged had an optimism score of +31.  But those whose QOL had dropped had an optimism score of only +18.

Those whose families suffer poverty or hunger are relatively less optimistic.  In the first quarter, net personal optimism was only +23 among those from the self-rated poor, compared to +39 among those who put themselves on the borderline, and +45 among those who self-rated as not poor.

Net personal optimism was only +14 among those whose families had experienced severe hunger, compared to +26 among those who had gone through moderate hunger, and +34 among those who had not experienced hunger at all.

Yet there is one economic handicap that does not seem to choke off personal optimism too much; this is joblessness.  In the first quarter, net personal optimism was +35 among the jobless, compared to +31 among those with jobs, and +33 among those not in the labor force (without a job but not looking for one).

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I thank Josefina Mar of SWS for tabulations done especially for this column.

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Contact SWS: or [email protected].