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Philippines
Thursday, March 28, 2024

More Pinoys get less optimistic

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THE optimism among Filipinos that the quality of their lives will get better sank to its lowest since September 2015, the latest Social Weather Stations survey showed. 

The survey, conducted among 1,200 respondents, found that 43 percent of those polled said the quality of their lives would improve in the next 12 months while 6 percent said it would get worse. 

While the numbers yielded a net personal optimism score of +36, which was “very high,” SWS noted that this was the lowest net optimism score since September 2015’s +33. 

A December 2016 poll showed that the net personal optimism among those polled was +45. 

“Before this, the net personal optimism had been at +40 and above for five consecutive quarters,” SWS said.

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Meanwhile, optimism across geographical areas remained “very high” but showed a significant decline in Mindanao, President Rodrigo Duterte’s home region. 

The net optimism score in Mindanao dropped to +32 in March from +54 in December, a decline of 22 percentage points.

The survey also noted the significant drop of 17 points in the net optimism score among the Class E respondents polled, where the “very high” +46 rating in December fell to a “high” +29.

Some 35 percent of the respondents likewise stressed that they were “gainers” as their lives had improved over the least year, while 19 percent said they were “losers” as their lives had worsened.

SWS likewise noted the “very high” optimism of the respondents in the Philippine economy, with 47 percent of those polled saying the economy would get better in the next 12 months while 9 percent said it would deteriorate. 

The +38 net optimism score about the economy, the SWS said, was 5 points lower than last quarter’s +43 rating.

Malacañang blamed the apparent loss of optimism among Filipinos on the rising food and gas prices.

“Net personal optimism was registered at +36, which could be  attributed to [the] respondents feeling the pinch of inflation last March following the increase in electricity cost[s] due to the Malampaya maintenance shutdown and [the] upward price adjustments in gasoline, diesel, kerosene and LPG,” Presidential Spokesman Ernesto Abella said. 

He downplayed the non-movement in the perception of Filipinos’ personal quality of life from the December 2016 survey, which stood at +16, saying the “life for Filipinos did not become worse in the two quarters the survey was done.”

The First Quarter Social Weather Survey, conducted from March 25 to 28, had sampling error margins of ±3 percent for the national percentages. 

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