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A recent
Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey revealed that
personal optimism among the middle and upper crust of
Philippine society has gone down, something unheard of
in the past two decades.
The SWS
indicators of future economic trends are the people’s
perceived directions of forthcoming change in (a) their
personal quality of life, and (b) the economy as a
whole. The indicator of the past economic trend is the
people’s perceived direction of change in their personal
quality of life from twelve months ago to the present.
The SWS
said this was the first time that optimism among classes
A, B and C was a little lower than those in classes D
and E. In June 2007, the SWS said being a “loser” rather
than a “gainer” was much higher in the ABC classes (net
–43) than in the D (net –18) or E (net –12) classes.
The SWS
added that in the past few SWS surveys, there were more
“personal Losers” in Metro Manila and Balance of Luzon,
than in the Visayas and Mindanao.
“This is
a change from the general pattern of the past two
decades, when the northern half of the country almost
always had an advantage over the southern half. There
were even quite few instances when personal Gainers
exceeded Losers in Metro Manila, even as personal Losers
exceeded Gainers in the Philippines as a whole,” the SWS
said.
The SWS
also noted that in the ’80s and ’90s, Net Gaining among
ABCs was positive. Only in March 1986, after the Edsa
revolution, Gainers were dominant among the Es and at no
time were Gainers dominant among the Ds.
Meanwhile, optimism on the country’s economy remained
neutral among all social classes. This, however, is more
favorable than the results of March 2006 when economic
pessimists outnumbered optimists by 23 points.
The SWS
said optimism about the future Economy is based on a
question about the economy in general and not about a
particular person. The survey noted that it is normal to
be more optimistic about personal quality of life than
about the economy as a whole.
The
first half of 2007 found 21 percent to 25 percent
expecting the Philippine economy to get better in the
next 12 months, and 20 percent to 24 percent expecting
it to get worse.
“By
area, the economic optimism is slightly positive in
Balance of Luzon and Mindanao, and slightly negative in
Metro Manila and the Visayas. Economic optimism is
presently about the same across socioeconomic classes,”
the SWS said.
The June
2007 survey also found 24-percent optimistic that the
Philippine economy would get better over the next 12
months, and another 24- percent pessimistic that it
would get worse.
This
gives a Net Economic Optimism of exactly zero, which can
be interpreted as an expectation of a stability over the
coming year.
“Stability has been the expectation in the past four
surveys, and is a favorable finding, since, from
mid-2001 to mid-2006, economic pessimists heavily
outnumbered economic optimists, by at least 11 points
and as much as 50 points,” the SWS said.
The
Second Quarter of 2007 Social Weather Survey was
conducted from June 27 to 30 using face-to-face
interviews of 1,200 adults. The respondents were divided
into random samples of 300 each in Metro Manila, the
Balance of Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao.
The area
estimates were weighted by National Statistics Office
medium-population projections for 2007 to obtain the
national estimates. |
