Alarming survey results on poverty and the daily minimum wage
The fight against poverty has been long-drawn. The highest poverty rate came after the martial law regime. The country’s poverty index was at its worst at 44.2 percent in 1985 in a population of 26,674,645 (estimated 11.7 million individuals), as shown in the 2009 Asian Development Bank report, 1985 up to 2006: (Asian Development Bank, 2009).
Today, it is still growing in numbers at a double-digit of 15.5 percent in a population of 116 million (estimated 18 million). Further complicated data comes from the Dec. 12 to 18, 2024 survey of the Social Weather Stations (SWS) on experienced hunger, indicating that self-rated hunger across-the-board almost doubled in 2024.
In the SWS March 2024 survey, 14.2 percent of families experienced involuntary hunger at least once in the past three months: Metro Manila with 19 percent (from 12.7 percent in December 2023); rest of Luzon, 15.3 percent (from 14.3 percent); the Visayas, 15 percent, (from 9.3 percent); and Mindanao, 8.7 percent (from 12 percent). Ironically, Mindanao’s hunger rate has declined. Why is it different in Mindanao?
Our concern is not experienced hunger, but the poverty rates. The government should work at policies based on on-the-ground gut statistics, not statistical replication tables. The National Economic and Development Authority (Neda) was caught months back in the controversy after stating that the poverty threshold used in government statistical measurement is P64 a day per capita.
After much public opprobrium over its pronouncement, the Neda explained that it was not meant to represent the cost of living today, but a statistical benchmark the government uses to measure if policies are making a dent in poverty over the years. That’s mere squeezing out of the heat.
The government cannot get solid bearing in fighting poverty and hunger, which are based on two different premises, and converge into making the right decisions on the rate of the minimum wage. The adjustment approved by the Regional Tripartite Wages and Productivity Board in the National Capital Region starting July 16, 2024, had increased the daily wage from P630 to P645 daily, a ridiculous P35 (hardly enough to buy a kilo of rice in the market).
It’s not enough to get off one’s back the labor unions agitating for an increase, but we expect more coherence and creativity in the government’s lasting approach and direction in fighting and ending poverty. Why can’t the Productivity Board recommend instead that increased revenues, hereon, be the basis for proportionately increasing the take-home pay, in a mutual agreement between labor and management as a happy win-win solution?
MARVEL K. TAN,
captbeloytan@gmail.com
