Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 The SWS Survey Time Series on Philippine Poverty and Hunger, 1983-2003* Mahar Mangahas Social Weather Stations Rapid Statistical Reporting of Philippine Poverty and Hunger On October 14, 2003, the private, non-stock, non-profit survey institute Social Weather Stations (www.sws.org.ph) issued the following quarterly report to the Philippine media: “The September 2003 Social Weather Survey has mixed economic findings, with Hunger at a record low 5.1%, Self-Rated Poverty up at 62% again, and Personal Optimism more or less unchanged from the slightly positive level of the Second Quarter. Hunger at record low “The proportion of households reporting that they had experienced hunger in the last 3 months, without having anything to eat, fell to only 5.1% in September, from what was already a very low 6.6% of households last June [Figure 1]. “The new national hunger figure of 5.1% is a new record low since July 1998, when SWS started conducting the only quarterly surveys of hunger in the Philippines [Annex Table 1]. “The previous record low of hunger was 6.5% (October 1999), while the record peak is 16.1% (March 2001). “The total proportion of hungry households consists of 4.0% who experienced hunger only once or else a few times, which is termed Moderate Hunger, and 1.2% who went through it often or always, which is Severe Hunger. “Moderate Hunger is at a new record low, and Severe Hunger is at its secondlowest level since 1998. “In the June 2003 SWS survey, Moderate Hunger had been 5.1%, and Severe Hunger had been 1.5%, of all households. * Thematic paper for the Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia, March 2004, organized by the Centre for Poverty Analysis (Sri Lanka), care of Myriam Fernando <mf-cepa@sltnet.lk>. Author’s email: <mahar.mangahas@sws.org.ph>. Page 1 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Self-Rated Poverty returns to 62% “The proportion of household heads rating their families as mahirap or poor was 62% in September, compared to a very low 53% in June, implying a return, roughly speaking, to conditions in November 2002, when Self-Rated Poverty was 61% [Figure 2 and Annex Table 2]. “The last quarter’s rise in Self-Rated Poverty coincides with a decline in the public’s Net Satisfaction with the national administration’s performance in Helping the Poor to -4 in September, from +27 last June (see SWS media releases of September 30, 2003 and June 26, 2003). “Among poor households, the national median poverty threshold, or home expense budget needed in order not to feel poor, as of September 2003, is a modest P8,000 per month (P14,000 in Metro Manila, P8,000 elsewhere in Luzon, P5,000 in the Visayas, and P5,000 in Mindanao). This means that these home budgets are sufficient to satisfy one-half of the poor.” Figure 1 Copyright © 2003 by Social Weather Stations 3rd Quarter 2003 Social Weather Report August 30 - September 14, 2003 National Survey SEVERITY OF HUNGER, PHILIPPINES: TOTAL HOUSEHOLDS, JULY 1998 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 ESTRADA ARROYO 20% 15% 10% Overall Hunger 5.1% Moderate Hunger 4.0% 5% Severe Hunger 1.2% 1998 * 1999 * 2000 * 2001 * 2002 * 2003 * Tanong: Nitong nakaraang 3 buwan, nangyari po ba kahit minsan na ang inyong pamilya ay nakaranas ng gutom at wala kayong makain? KUNG OO: Nangyari po ba ‘yan ng MINSAN LAMANG, MGA ILANG BESES, MADALAS, o PALAGI? 1 SEVERITY OF HUNGER, PHILIPPINES: TOTAL HOUSEHOLDS, JULY 1998 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 Page 2 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Figure 2 Copyright © 2003 by Social Weather Stations 3rd Quarter 2003 Social Weather Report August 30 - September 14, 2003 National Survey SELF-RATED POVERTY: HOUSEHOLDS WHO ARE “MAHIRAP” APRIL 1983 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 80% MARCOS AQUINO RAMOS ESTRADA ARROYO 70% 60% 50% Self-Rated 62% Poverty 40% 30% Official (NSCB) Poverty Incidence) 20% 10% 1983 * 1984 * 1985 * 1986 * 1987 * 1988 * 1989 * 1990 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1994 * 1995 * 1996 * 1997 * 1998 * 1999 * 2000 * 2001 * 2002 * 2003 * SRP Question: Where would you place your family in this card? (Not poor, On the line, Poor) 3 SELF-RATED POVERTY: HOUSEHOLDS WHO ARE “MAHIRAP” APRIL 1983 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 Filling the poverty time-series gap The quotation above demonstrates that a survey-based, public-use system for quarterly monitoring of poverty and hunger has been operating in the Philippines for many years. As of September 2003, the time series of SWS national surveys amount to 63 observations on poverty, beginning April 1983 and quarterly since 1992, and 22 quarterly observations on hunger since July 1998. Standard SWS surveys use face-toface interviews of efficient, global-standard, national samples of 1,200 statistically representative households (300 each in Metro Manila, the Balance of Luzon, the Visayas and Mindanao), from 240 geographical spots selected from all regions. The sample spots and respondents are freshly drawn for each survey, rather than a fixed panel of locations or individuals. Error margins of ±3% for national percentages and ±6% for area-level percentages (Figures 3 and 4) should be applied. Page 3 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Figure 3: SELF-RATED POVERTY: HOUSEHOLDS WHO ARE “MAHIRAP”, BY AREA July 1985 to September 2003 MARCOS AQUINO RAMOS ESTRADA ARROYO 90% Mindanao 79% 80% 70% Visayas 64% 60% Bal. Luzon 58% 50% 40% 30% NCR 44% 20% 10% 1985 *1986 *1987 *1988 *1989 *1990 *1991 *1992 *1993 *1994 *1995 *1996 *1997 *1998 *1999 *2000 *2001 *2002 *2003 * Figure 4: HOUSEHOLDS WHO EXPERIENCED HUNGER, BY AREA July 1998 to September 2003 ESTRADA ARROYO 25% 20% 15% 10% NCR 7.3% Mindanao 5.3% Bal. Luzon 4.7% 5% Visayas 4.3% * 1998 * 1999 * 2000 * 2001 * 2002 * 2003 * Page 4 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 The survey items on hunger and poverty are non-commissioned, and are included on SWS’s own initiative. The Social Weather Surveys are supported by individual and institutional subscribers, who have no proprietary rights over the data, which are archived for public use at the SWS Survey Data Library. The SWS data series are an original innovation, entirely made-in-the-Philippines (Abrera 1976, Mangahas 1995) rather than introduced from outside. They are the product of self-sustained survey operations, and are not a mere research experiment (Mangahas and Guerrero 1998). They are regularly released to the mass media, discussed in academic circles, and directly presented to high government officials, including the President and cabinet officials concerned with the economy and with poverty-program-coordination and poverty-alleviation, providing them with the world’s most rapid and most up-to-date system for statistical monitoring of poverty and hunger in a country at the national level. Figure 2 shows that, in contrast, the official time series on Philippine poverty consist of only 6 points during the entire period, namely 1985, 1988, 1991, 1994, 1997, and 2000, the reference years of the triennial Family Income and Expenditures Surveys (FIES), whose results become available after a lag of at least one year. The official series of only a few observations suggests a steady and gentle decline of poverty between 1985 and 1997, and an increase between 1997 and 2000. The SWS series of many observations, on the other hand, provides more dynamic details, namely: (a) that the downward trend between 1985 and 1997 also featured spikes both downward (especially in 1987 when complete price stability afforded consumers a relief from the hyperinflation of the last two Marcos years) and upward (particularly during the Kuwait/Iraq War period of 1991-92 when the government disastrously stuck to a counterglobal oil price policy); and (b) that the post-1997 upward trend had registered as early as 1998 (together with the well-known Asian financial crisis). An official poverty line was set for the first time in 1986, and applied to the 1985 and 1988 FIES, but it was lowered in real terms in 1991; the official data points in Figure 2 use the official poverty line of 1991, corrected for inflation. Official statistics on poverty are so out-of-date that it is the SWS statistics that were recently cited by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in her State of the Nation Address (www.op.gov.ph/speeches) of July 2003. The next official poverty reading will pertain to 2003 and will not be known until at least mid-2004, or effectively not until after the President completes her current Page 5 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 term in office. Official poverty reports so few and far between can hardly compete for public attention with GNP and unemployment figures reported quarterly, inflation rates reported monthly, and stock prices and foreign exchange rates reported daily. There are two basic problems with the government’s approach, which have prevented poverty from being officially measured oftener than once every three years. First of all, the number of items needed for an orthodox questionnaire on incomes or expenditures is much too large to attach to an existing multi-purpose household survey – say, the government’s quarterly Labor Force Survey which generates its unemployment statistics – but requires a survey, and hence a special budget, of its own. In response to criticism about the infrequency of the FIES, a new official survey was launched in 1998, named the Annual Poverty Indicators Survey (APIS), which implemented a much shorter version of the FIES, and was supposed to fill in the poverty-data gap in non-FIES years. Unfortunately, the government never released any APIS-based poverty incidence rates, apparently for failure to anticipate that survey responses on incomes or expenditures based on the short APIS questionnaire would naturally be less complete (or show lower average income/expenditure per family) than when based on the more comprehensive FIES questionnaire, and thus give a higher computed poverty-magnitude, for any given poverty line. Government statisticians felt that it would be embarrassing to report a new 1998 (APIS-based) poverty rate numerically higher than its established 1997 (FIES-based) poverty rate, even though, scientifically speaking, such would be a comparison of apples with oranges. In reality, an APIS-type poverty series is not capable of splicing together the FIES-poverty series, and instead should be used as an alternative poverty-trend indicator on its own merit, despite giving poverty magnitudes seemingly above those of the FIES. The second, and perhaps more difficult, problem with the government’s approach is its insistence on producing poverty estimates at the provincial level. In the Philippines, the first level of local government below the National Government is the Province, of which there are 80, and thus a minimal sample size of say 300-400 households per province implies a gigantic national sample of 24,000-32,000 households, which is too expensive to replicate annually, let alone quarterly. Managers of national government statistics argue that they must generate poverty data not only at the national level but also for every province in order to get an FIES budget approved by national legislators (each of whom has only a three-year term in office) whose main intent is to help their Page 6 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 respective local constituencies compete for a larger share in the poverty-program resources of the national government. The consequence of over-centralization of functions, including poverty-estimation, at the national government level, has been an excessive focus of anti-poverty policy on spatial issues, such as the identification (fixed for three years!) of “priority provinces” for poverty-alleviation, and a neglect of dynamic issues, for instance the proposal to liberalize rice importation for the benefit of the mass of consumers, instead of keeping it restricted for the sake of the narrow sector of rice growers. Social Weather Stations Social Weather Stations was established in the Philippines in 1985 as a private, not-for-profit yet enterprising, institute organized for scientific purposes.1 Its mission is to regularly generate social survey data: first, to stimulate the eye into learning the extent of social problems, second, to influence the heart or the conscience into resolving to work harder in order to solve the problems, and third, to guide the mind into finding effective solutions for the problems. This is in line with the modern switch of the global social indicators movement from the technocratic model — which believes that the generation of relevant data automatically promotes technical solutions for social problems — to the enlightenment model (Land 1996), which emphasizes the placement of quality-of-life issues on the political agenda by supplying data for public debate both through the mass media and through professional channels. SWS believes that private institutions can and should play a role in the generation, for public use, of poverty incidence rates and other indicators of the ‘social weather’ which are meaningful, understandable, credible, frequent, and sustainable, and therefore works to operationalize social indicators in the Philippines (Mangahas 1991). It aims for 1 This model of organization has similarities to the National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago, the Institute of Social Research (ISR) at the University of Michigan, the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research at the University of Connecticut, and the National Center for Social Research (NCSR) at the University of London, all private institutes. SWS is co-member with NORC and NCSR in the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) and co-member with ISR in the World Values Surveys. Page 7 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 its survey data to be socially relevant, simple to understand, and up-to-date.2 SWS practices social advocacy through statistics -- it deliberately brings poverty and many other3 conditions of the socially disadvantaged into public view by means of regular statistical monitoring in order to strengthen the capacity of these conditions to compete for the attention of policy-makers. The SWS survey indicators The SWS hunger indicator is the proportion of household heads reporting that their families had experienced hunger, without having anything to eat,4 at least once in the last three months. The SWS surveys also ask for the frequency of the experience, thus obtaining a classification hunger into moderate and severe. This measure of hunger is not subjective, but is as objective as the standard statistical measures of unemployment and underemployment, which also rely on self-reporting by survey respondents and are in principle verifiable by other people, for instance their neighbors.5 No other statistical data series for hunger exists in the Philippines. 2 The accuracy of SWS surveys, including exit polls, during election years (Mangahas, Guerrero and Sandoval 2001) has helped immensely to convince skeptics of the technical quality of its Quality-of-Life surveys, in the same way that George Gallup’s election track record gave credence to his bread-and-butter market research. Successful performance in election research is a basic test of survey quality that official statistical agencies in the Philippines have never had to face. 3 In particular, the SWS quarterly national surveys include victimization by common crimes (home break-in, robbery outside the home, violence, motor-vehicle theft), as wells as the usual gainer/loser and optimist/pessimist indicators used in the European Union’s Eurobarometer and in consumer confidence indexes in the United States and other countries. 4 The unavailability of food to the family is a critical condition, which ensures that it excludes cases of voluntary fasting, for instance the annual fasting of Muslims between sunup and sundown during the month of Ramadan. 5 National unemployment and underemployment are also tracked in the SWS surveys, the difference from official definitions only being that the latter regard the labor force as starting with age 15 whereas the SWS survey respondents are age 18 and over, i.e., of voting age. Page 8 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 The SWS poverty indicator is the proportion of household heads who rate their own families as mahirap, which is Tagalog for ‘poor’. This measure of poverty is subjective from the viewpoint of the family, not the researcher, and is thus capable of being validated by independent surveys using the same approach. The SWS surveys also ask for household heads’ self-declared poverty thresholds. Self-rated poverty is of a much larger magnitude than officially-measured poverty, because the official poverty line is only about equal to the median self-rated poverty threshold, i.e., is adequate to satisfy only one-half of the poor. All poverty measurement approaches necessarily incorporate some norms or values. On the one hand, the orthodox predetermined, ostensibly objective, poverty-line approach makes use of some top-down or official values. On the other hand, the candidly subjective, or self-rated, approach makes use of bottom-up, or community, or citizens’ values.6 Respect for bottom-up values in the construction of a statistical indicator is essentially democratic; insistence on acceptance of top-down values is essentially elitist. In the SWS approach, the poverty self-rating does not depend on any predetermined or top-down poverty line. In each survey, the household head is asked to point to where the household fares in a showcard (half of the sample uses the left card seen in Figure 5, and the other half uses the right card) featuring only the word POOR, the negative (not the opposite) term NOT POOR, and a line in-between. The word consistently used for POOR, mahirap, expresses the least degree of hardship among various Tagalog terms for poverty.7 It bears pointing out that, unlike other approaches in the literature,8 the SWS survey question carefully avoids inclusion of the term rich, and 6 Linked to the notion of subjective poverty lines is that of consensual poverty (Gordon and Spicker 1999). 7 See Figure 5 for the counterpart words for mahirap in other Philippine languages. 8 Using the Eurobarometer survey question: “Taking everything into account, at about what level is your family situated as far as standard of living is concerned? You may answer by giving a figure between 1 and 7 — number 1 means a poor family and number 7 a rich family.” -- Riffault (1991) interpreted numbers 1 and 2 as self-rated poverty and reported that European poverty rose from 7.6% in 1976 to 10.7% in 1983. Using the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey question -- “Please imagine a 9-step ladder where on the bottom, the first step, stand the poorest people, and on the highest Page 9 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 thus counts as poor only those who positively identify themselves with the term poor and are not merely, or additionally, induced to adopt it as a way of stating that they will never be wealthy. Alleged weaknesses of the self-rating approach. The poverty self-rating approach is not to be used for purposes for which it is obviously not designed. The selfrating system is obviously not meant to determine the existence of poverty at an individual family level. It cannot serve as a means-test for an agency which provides assistance to the poor, any more than it can serve as a guide to an exclusive country club which aims “to keep the riff-raff out”. As in any survey of individuals, there should be no “right” or “wrong” answer to a self-rating question, i.e., respondents should sense neither any promise of reward nor any threat of punishment attaching to any choice of answer. This may give a slight advantage to private survey groups in applying the self-rating approach, but need not exclude government survey agencies entirely -- after all, people have long been giving Labor Force Survey interviewers honest answers about being unemployed, without expecting to be given jobs by the government. The express purpose of the SWS constructs of self-rated poverty and self-declared hunger is to create practical means of monitoring of the state of aggregate poverty and hunger regularly and rapidly over time. In order for replication to be affordable, this is being done (a) only at the national level and for very large geographical areas, thus requiring efficiently small sample sizes, (b) using simple and practical survey questions drawn from both social indicators research and opinion research, and (c) invariably as part of a general survey of the Quality of Life, thus sharing the cost with other elements of the survey research agenda. step, the ninth, stand the rich. On which step do you stand today?” – Ravaillon and Lokshin (2002) likewise associate the lowest two rungs with poverty. Why the third rung or any higher rungs may not also be interpreted as poor is an arbitrary choice of the said researchers. Page 10 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Figure 5: SHOWCARDS FOR THE SWS QUESTION ON SELF-RATED POVERTY Question: "Saan po ninyo ilalagay ang inyong pamilya sa kard na ito?" (Where would you place your family in this card?) HINDI MAHIRAP (Not poor) MAHIRAP (Poor) MAHIRAP (Poor) HINDI MAHIRAP (Not poor) Philippine Language Tagalog Cebuano Bicolano Ilocano Ilonggo Pangasinense Waray Maguindanon Poor Mahirap Pobre Pobre Napanglaw Imol Mairap Pobre Miskinan Not Poor Hindi Mahirap Dili Pobre Bacong Pobre Saan nga Napanglaw Indi Imol Aliwan Mairap Diri Pobre Dikena Miskinan Self-rated food-poverty. The self-rating technique can be applied not only to poverty in general but also to poverty along any particular domain, such as food, housing, etc. From time to time, the SWS surveys ask where the household fares ACCORDING TO ITS FOOD, using the same showcard.9 The strong relationship of self-rated poverty to self-rated food-poverty is illustrated in Table 1. 9 Some examples in the literature of subjective-poverty survey questions for particular domains are: (a) “I would like to ask your opinion about your family’s standard of living. Concerning your family’s food consumption over the past one month/your family’s Page 11 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Table 1: SELF-RATED POVERTY IN TERMS OF FOOD, BY GENERAL SELF-RATED POVERTY Philippines, September 1996 and September 2003 SELF-RATED POVERTY IN TERMS OF FOOD GENERAL SELF-RATED POVERTY Not Poor On the Line Poor September 1996 Total Philippines 15% 28% 58% Food-Not Poor (18%) Food-On the Line (32%) Food-Poor (50%) 87 9 4 7 88 6 6 11 83 100% 100% 100% Total Philippines 17% 21% 62% Food-Not Poor (19%) Food-On the Line (26%) Food-Poor (55%) 79 9 12 4 83 13 7 12 81 100% 100% 100% September 2003 Note: Figures in parentheses are nationwide proportions. Self-rated poverty thresholds. In the SWS surveys, the household heads who rate their families as POOR are asked this next question: “How much would your family need for home expenses each month in order not to feel poor anymore?” Those who rate themselves as NOT POOR or as ON THE LINE are asked the slightly revised question: “How much would a family, of the same size as yours, which felt it was poor, housing/your family’s clothing/the health care your family gets/your children’s schooling, which of the following is true? Answers: It was less than adequate/just adequate/more than adequate/not applicable for your family’s needs.” [Note: “adequate” means no more nor less than what the respondent considers to be the minimum consumption needs of the family.] – Pardhan and Ravaillon (2000), using the 1993 Jamaica Living Conditions Survey and the 1995/96 Nepal Living Standards Survey. (b) “Please answer by using the following scale in which 0 means totally unhappy and 10 means totally happy: How happy are you at present with your life as a whole/your job/your financial situation/your housing/your health/your leisure/your environment?” – Van Praag, Frijters and Ferrer-ICarbonell (2003), using the 1992-97 German Socio-Economic Panel. Page 12 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 need for home expenses each month in order not to feel poor anymore?” Thus these are Minimum Home Budget Questions, for (a) for all purchases in general, or (b) for food purchases in particular. The SWS survey questions for both self-rated poverty and the self-rated poverty line deliberately focus ONLY ON THE LITERAL WORD POOR, rather than attempt to find Filipino equivalents for English idioms such as ‘getting along’ or ‘making ends meet’.10 When the SWS surveys obtain food-poverty self-ratings, the corresponding follow-up food-threshold question refers to the home budget needed ‘in order not to be poor in terms of food’. Filipino household heads are now tending to set their poverty thresholds in the thousands of pesos -- a thousand pesos is less than US$20 at the current exchange rate of about P55 per $1 -- rather than in the mere hundreds of pesos, as they did in the mid-1980s. Figure 6 shows the time series of the median threshold from 1985 to the present. The weakening of the growth of the median threshold in recent years suggests that the Filipino poor are using belt-tightening as a means of coping with the Asian economic crisis which started in 1997/98. The current median threshold of Php8,000 for a monthly home budget for the entire family is equivalent to just above US$145 per month, or US$4.85 per day. This is less than one dollar per person per day for an average family of 5 members11, which is quite modest. Figure 7 traces the cumulative distribution of the self-rated poverty threshold specifically for those who rate themselves as Poor, in the September 2003 SWS survey. It shows that 85% of poor Philippine households would have enough to escape poverty if given Php15,000 as a home spending budget per month -- equivalent to less than Php273 per month, or US$9.09 per day, or only US$1.82 per person per day for an average family of five. 10 The phrase to get along has been used for the Minimum Income Question by the Gallup Polls for many years (Kilpatrick 1973), and the phrase to make ends meet has been used by the National Opinion Research Center of the University of Chicago (Davis 1982) and by the Leyden group (Goedhart et al. 1977) Another example is the Income Evaluation Question (Ravailon and Lokshin 2002): “What income do you consider as very bad, bad, not good, good, good, very good?” 11 The actual average family size in the SWS September 2003 national survey is 5.0. Page 13 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Figure 6: MEDIAN SELF-RATED POVERTY THRESHOLDS: TOTAL HOUSEHOLDS, July 1985 to September 2003 MARCOS AQUINO RAMOS ESTRADA ARROYO Thousands P10000 P9000 Median Poverty Threshold P8000 P7000 P6000 P5000 Official (NSCB) Poverty Line P4000 P3000 P2000 P1000 1985 * 1986 * 1987 * 1988 * 1989 * 1990 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1994 * 1995 * 1996 * 1997 * 1998 * 1999 * 2000 * 2001 * 2002 * 2003 * Figure 7: CUMULATIVE DISTRIBUTION OF THE POVERTY THRESHOLD OF THE SELF-RATED POOR Philippines, September 2003 Cumulative % 100% 92% 80% 95% 85% 74% 60% 55% 42% 40% 24% 20% 0% 0 4 5 8 10 15 20 30 Monthly home budget in order not to feel poor (thousand pesos / month) Page 14 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Current, chronic, and seasonal poverty. The time frame of the SWS poverty self-rating refers to the moment when the respondent is answering the survey question. Thus it refers to current poverty. SWS has brought out the aspect of chronic poverty by asking the self-rated poor for how many of the last five years they have been this way, and the aspect of seasonal poverty by asking the self-rated poor for how many of the past 12 months they have been this way. When last surveyed by SWS in April 1997, 80% of poor Philippine households reported that they had been poor for ALL OF THE PAST 5 YEARS, and 83% reported that they had been poor for AT LEAST 10 OF THE LAST 12 MONTHS, i.e., chronic poverty was 80% and non-seasonal poverty was 83% in 1997. Cross-sectional plausibility. In general, the poverty self-rating approach produces plausible cross-sectional results. Households rating themselves as Poor tend to suffer hunger more severely (Table 2), have fewer home amenities and possessions (Table 3), and are more prone to sickness (Table 4) than those who rate themselves as Not-Poor or Borderline. Larger families set a higher poverty threshold for themselves (Table 5). The incidence of poverty is higher among families with seven or more members than among those with six or less (Table 6). Table 2: HUNGER IN RELATION TO GENERAL SELF-RATED POVERTY AND TO SELF-RATED POVERTY IN TERMS OF FOOD [Row Percent] Philippines, September 2003 Households who experienced hunger Total Only once A few times Often Always TOTAL PHILIPPINES 5.1% 2.0% 1.9% 0.9% 0.3% SELF-RATED POVERTY Not poor (17%) On the line (21%) Poor (62%) 3.0 3.5 6.3 1.9 0.9 2.5 0.9 0.9 2.5 -1.6 0.9 0.3 -0.4 SELF-RATED POVERTY IN TERMS OF FOOD Food-Not poor (19%) Food-On the line (26%) Food-Poor (55%) 4.3 2.4 6.7 3.1 0.2 2.6 1.3 1.5 2.3 -0.7 1.3 --0.5 Note: Figures in parentheses are nationwide proportions. Page 15 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Table 3: PRESENCE OF HOUSEHOLD ITEMS, BY SELF-RATED POVERTY CLASS Philippines, September 2003 HOUSEHOLD ITEM Electricity Television Piped water Refrigerator Cellular phone Washing machine Landline phone Flush toilet 4 wheel motor vehicle Table 4: Total RP Not Poor Borderline Poor 85% 72 65 42 30 26 15 11 9 96% 86 86 67 57 53 35 29 20 93% 88 68 54 38 33 20 11 10 79% 62 59 31 19 17 8 7 5 EXPERIENCE OF GETTING SICK IN THE PAST 2 WEEKS, BY SELF-RATED POVERTY CLASS [Row Percent] Philippines, September 1997 and June 2000 In these past two weeks, did you get sick or not? SELF-RATED POVERTY YES NO September 1997 Total Philippines 29% 71% Not poor [14%] On the line [27%] Poor [58%] 19 28 32 81 72 68 Total Philippines 28% 72% Not poor [12%] On the line [34%] Poor [54%] 26 23 31 74 77 69 June 2000 Page 16 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Table 5: POVERTY THRESHOLD, BY FAMILY SIZE Philippines, September 2003 (Minimum Home Budget in Pesos per Month) FAMILY SIZE 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 and up Table 6: Total RP Mean Median 10,762.7 8,115.3 10,151.1 11,859.0 11,666.1 13,766.9 12,911.1 14,903.6 12,309.0 14,044.6 8,000 5,000 8,000 6,000 8,000 10,000 10,000 10,000 10,000 10,000 Total Poor Mean 6,912.7 6,905.0 8,789.3 8,455.6 9,465.7 9,932.6 11,520.0 14,400.2 11,911.3 13,757.9 Median 5,000 5,000 6,000 6,000 7,000 7,000 10,000 10,000 10,000 10,000 SELF-RATED POVERTY CLASS, BY FAMILY SIZE Philippines, September 2003 FAMILY SIZE 1-2 3-4 5-6 7 and up Total RP Not Poor Borderline 14% 35 30 21 18% 17 18 14 Poor 20% 22 22 19 61% 61 61 67 The context of general economic, social, and political development A better understanding of short-run fluctuations and trends in poverty and hunger in the Philippines is bound to emerge from an integrated analysis of the SWS survey data on poverty with time series on other economic, social, and political variables, generated by SWS itself and other institutions. A Social Weather Report covers a wide array of social concerns aside from economic well-being, including victimization by common crimes and the quality of governance, among others. The regular SWS indicators of governance include public satisfaction12 with the administration’s Overall Performance and along the specific issue of Helping the Poor (Figure 8). 12 Net Satisfaction is defined as the percentage Very/Somewhat Satisfied less the percentage Very/Somewhat Dissatisfied with the government’s performance on a Page 17 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Figure 8 Copyright © 2003 by Social Weather Stations Confidential, not for public release 3rd Quarter 2003 Social Weather Report PUBLIC SATISFACTION WITH THE NATIONAL ADMINISTRATION ON HELPING THE POOR AQUINO RAMOS ESTRADA ARROYO Helping the Poor -4 Overall Administration -6 1 * Net figures (% Satisfied minus % Dissatisfied) correctly rounded. PUBLIC SATISFACTION WITH THE NATIONAL ADMINISTRATION ON HELPING THE POOR A preliminary econometric analysis (Mangahas 1995) has indicated that the rate of inflation is a very significant macroeconomic variable affecting short-run or quarterly changes in poverty, and that unemployment is of much lesser importance. Gross National Product and Gross Domestic Product per capita seem to be of no significance in the short-run, i.e., quarter-to-quarter or even year-to-year, although they are probably essential to the long-run eradication of poverty. Closer consideration of food production and distribution, social welfare relief efforts, conditions of natural disaster, armed conflicts, and other contemporary historical specific issue. It is based on a 5-point survey item which includes the neutral response of Neither Satisfied Nor Dissatisfied among the choices offered up-front. A positive Net Satisfaction rating implies that Satisfaction dominates over Dissatisfaction. On account of the neutral response category, Net Satisfaction may be positive even though the Gross Satisfied are less than an absolute majority. Page 18 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 factors are needed in order to arrive at a realistic understanding of the dynamics of poverty and hunger. References Abrera, Ma. Alcestis S., “Philippine Poverty Thresholds,” in M. Mangahas, ed., Measuring Philippine Development: Report of the Social Indicators Project, Development Academy of the Philippines, Metro Manila, 1976. Goedhart, Theo et al., “The Poverty Line: Theory and Measurement,” Journal of Human Resources, 12:503-20, 1977. Gordon, David, and Paul Spicker, eds., The International Glossary on Poverty, CROP International Series on Poverty, Zed Books, London, 1999. Kilpatrick, R. W., “The Income Elasticity of the Poverty Line,” The Review of Economics and Statistics, vol. 55, 1973. Land, Kenneth C., “Social Indicators and the Quality-of-Life: Where Do We Stand in the Mid-1990s?” Social Indicators Network News, 45:5-8, February 1996. Mangahas, Mahar, “Monitoring the Economic and Social Weather in the Philippines,” in Kenneth J. Arrow, ed., Issues in Contemporary Economics, Volume 1: Markets and Welfare, Macmillan, London, 1991. Mangahas, Mahar, “Self-Rated Poverty in the Philippines, 1981-1992,” International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 7:1, 1995. Mangahas, Mahar, and Linda Luz B. Guerrero, “Self-Sustained Quality of Life Monitoring: The Philippine Social Weather Reports,” Social Weather Stations Occasional Paper, December 1998. Mangahas, Mahar, Linda Luz B. Guerrero, and Gerardo A. Sandoval, “Opinion Polling and National Elections in the Philippines, 1992-2001,” Paper presented at the 2001 International Conference of the World Association for Public Opinion Research, Rome; Social Weather Stations Occasional Paper, September 2001. Pradhan, M., and M. Ravaillon, “Measuring Poverty Using Perceptions of Consumption Adequacy,” Review of Economics and Statistics, 82:462-471, 2000. Ravaillon, M. and M. Lokshin, “Self-Rated Economic Welfare in Russia,” European Economic Review, 46:1453-73, 2002. Riffault, Helene, “How Poverty Is Perceived,” in Karlheinz Reif and Ronald Inglehart, eds., Eurobarometer: The Dynamics of European Public Opinion, Macmillan Academic and Professional Ltd., London, 1991. Page 19 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Van Praag, B. et al., “A Comparison Between the Food Ratio Poverty Line and the Leyden Poverty Line,” Review of Economics and Statistics, 64:691-4, November 1982. Van Praag, B., P. Frijters and A. Ferrer-i-Carbonell, “The Anatomy of Subjective Well-Being,” Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 51:29-49, 2003. Page 20 of 21 Thematic Paper for the 2004 Regional Conference on Poverty Monitoring in Asia Revised 31 December 2003 Annex Table 1 Copyright © 2003 by Social Weather Stations 3rd Quarter 2003 Social Weather Report August 30 - September 14, 2003 National Survey SEVERITY OF HUNGER, PHILIPPINES: TOTAL HOUSEHOLDS, JULY 1998 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 July Sep Nov Mar Jun Oct Dec Mar Jul Sep Dec Mar Jul Sep Nov Mar May Sep Nov Mar Jun Sep OVERALL MODERATE SEVERE 8.9% 9.7 14.5 7.7 8.1 6.5 11.0 11.2 10.5 8.8 12.7 16.1 9.8 9.3 10.4 11.1 11.5 8.8 9.0 6.7 6.6 5.1 5.7% 6.0 9.2 5.0 5.4 5.1 7.6 6.3 4.9 5.0 8.5 10.1 6.1 5.7 7.1 7.5 8.4 7.3 7.3 5.9 5.1 4.0 3.2% 3.7 5.3 2.7 2.7 1.5 3.4 5.0 5.4 3.8 4.2 6.0 3.7 3.6 3.3 3.6 3.1 1.6 1.7 0.8 1.5 1.2 98 98 98 99 99 99 99 00 00 00 00 01 01 01 01 02 02 02 02 03 03 03 Tanong: Nitong nakaraang 3 buwan, nangyari po ba kahit minsan na ang inyong pamilya ay nakaranas ng gutom at wala kayong makain? KUNG OO: Nangyari po ba ‘yan ng MINSAN LAMANG, MGA ILANG BESES, MADALAS, o PALAGI? 2 SEVERITY OF HUNGER, PHILIPPINES: TOTAL HOUSEHOLDS, JULY 1998 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 Annex Table 2 Copyright © 2003 by Social Weather Stations 3rd Quarter 2003 Social Weather Report August 30 - September 14, 2003 National Survey SELF-RATED POVERTY: HOUSEHOLDS WHO ARE “MAHIRAP” APRIL 1983 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 Official SRP Poverty MARCOS APR 83 JUL 85 1985 AQUINO MAY 86 OCT 86 MAR 87 OCT 87 SEP 88 1988 FEB 89 SEP 89 APR 90 NOV 90 JUL 91 NOV 91 1991 FEB 92 APR 92 RAMOS SEP 92 DEC 92 APR 93 JUL 93 55% 74 44% 66 67 43 51 66 40 63 60 66 70 71 62 40 72 68 65 58 65 59 Official SRP Poverty RAMOS (cont.) SEP 93 DEC 93 APR 94 AUG 94 NOV 94 DEC 94 1994 MAR 95 JUN 95 OCT 95 DEC 95 APR 96 JUN 96 SEP 96 DEC 96 APR 97 JUN 97 SEP 97 DEC 97 1997 FEB 98 MAR 98 APR 98 68% 68 70 67 68 68 36% 63 66 62 61 59 57 58 61 58 58 58 63 32 57 64 60 Official SRP Poverty ESTRADA JUL 98 SEP 98 NOV 98 MAR 99 JUN 99 OCT 99 DEC 99 MAR 00 APR 00 JUL 00 SEP 00 DEC 00 2000 ARROYO MAR 01 JUL 01 SEP 01 NOV 01 MAR 02 MAY 02 SEP 02 NOV 02 MAR 03 JUN 03 SEP 03 61% 65 59 62 60 63 59 59 60 54 57 56 34% 59 66 63 60 58 66 66 61 59 53 62 Sources: Social Weather Stations (1986-2003); NSCB Official Poverty Incidence based on Family Income and Expenditure Surveys (1985-2000) ; BBC (1985); DAP (1983) 4 SELF-RATED POVERTY: HOUSEHOLDS WHO ARE “MAHIRAP” APRIL 1983 TO SEPTEMBER 2003 Page 21 of 21