Metro Manila (CNN Philippines, January 17) — Almost half of Filipino families consider themselves poor, according to a Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey released on Wednesday.
The poll, conducted from Dec. 8 to 11, 2023, showed a slight decline to 47% or 13 million families who rated themselves as poor. In September 2023, self-rated poor families stood at 48%.
“The 1-point decline in the nationwide Self-Rated Poor figure between September 2023 and December 2023 was due to a decrease in Mindanao, combined with a slight increase in Balance Luzon (or Luzon outside Metro Manila) and steady scores in Metro Manila and the Visayas,” the SWS said.
The survey found that the percentage of families in Mindanao who consider themselves poor fell from 71% to 61%.
But self-rated poor families in Balance Luzon slightly rose from 35% to 39%.
Meanwhile, the figure barely moved in Metro Manila from 38% to 37%, and in the Visayas from 59% to 58%.
Of the 13 million self-rated poor families, the SWS survey showed 8.1% or 2.2 million families were “newly poor” or those who were not poor one to four years ago.
Further, the December poll showed that 33% of families rated themselves living in borderline conditions, and 20% consider themselves as not poor.
The non-commissioned survey had a sampling error margin of ±2.8% for national percentages, and ±5.7% each for Metro Manila, Balance Luzon, the Visayas, and Mindanao.
The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) earlier reported that the country’s poverty rate fell to 22.4% in the first half of 2023, which translates to 25.24 million.
PSA said this is a decrease from the 23.7% recorded in the same period in 2021.
