SWS: Less Filipinos believe life will get better in next 12 months

FILE: A latest survey of the Social Weather Stations (SWS) showed that fewer Filipinos expect their quality of life to get better in the coming 12 months. (Photo by Glendale Lapastora (1)/Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0)

The latest survey of the Social Weather Stations (SWS) showed that fewer Filipinos expect their quality of life to get better in the coming 12 months.

The First Quarter 2018 Social Weather Survey, released on Wednesday, May 23, found that 46 percent of adults were “expecting their personal quality of life to improve in the next 12 months (Optimists)” and six percent of them were expecting it to get worse (Pessimists) for a net personal optimism score of +40, which is classified by the SWS as “excellent.”

“This is 6 points below the record-high excellent +46 (49% Optimists, 3% Pessimists) in December 2017, and similar to the excellent +40 in June 2017,” the polling firm said.

According to the SWS, the net personal optimism has been excellent (+40 and above) since December 2015; however, it dropped in March 2017 when it only got a rate of “very high” +36.

The net personal optimism, the SWS reported, stayed excellent in Mindanao and in Balance Luzon, although down by five points from +45 in December last year.

On the other hand, it fell by one grade from “excellent” to “very high” in Metro Manila, dropped by 12 points from +49 in December 2017.

It also stayed “very high” in the Visayas, despite an eight-point decrease from September to December.

This March 2018 survey, conducted from March 23-27, 2018, used face-to-face interviews of 1,200 adults (18 years old and above) nationwide, with sampling error margins of plus-minus three percent for national percentages, and plus-minus six percent each for Metro Manila, Balance Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao.

Optimism on PH economy

Meanwhile, the same survey also showed that 42 percent of Filipinos were still optimistic that the Philippine economy in 2019 will improve, while 12 percent of them said that the economy “would deteriorate,” for a net optimism about the economy score of +31, classified as “excellent” by the polling firm.

“This is 11 points below the excellent +42 (52% Optimistic about the Economy, 9% Pessimistic about the Economy, correctly rounded) in December 2017,” it said.

The net optimism about the economy has been “excellent” (+20 and above) since December 2015, reaching as high as +56 in June 2016.

It also remained “excellent” in Mindanao, Balance Luzon, Metro Manila, and the Visayas, according to the SWS.

The pollster said that the net optimism about the economy “refers to expectations about the general Philippine economy,” and is different from the net personal optimism which refers to expectations in personal quality of life.