Poll: 33% say quality of life improved

MANILA, Philippines — About one in every three Filipinos said quality of life improved in the first year of the Marcos administration, the second quarter survey conducted by Social Weather Stations (SWS) showed.

The survey, conducted from June 28 to July 1 and released on Tuesday night, found 33 percent of the respondents saying their personal quality of life improved in the past 12 months.

Some 22 percent said it got worse, while 45 percent said it was the same.

Those who said that their quality of life improved in the past year slightly increased from 29 percent obtained in a similar survey last March. It is, however, still lower than the 39 percent in the December 2019 survey conducted before the pandemic.

Meanwhile, those who said their quality of life worsened slightly dropped from 25 percent in March, while those who said it was the same was relatively steady from 46 percent.

The latest survey resulted in a “net gainers” score of +11, the rounded off difference of those who said their lives worsened from those who said their lives improved.

It was up from +5 in March, but still below the pre-pandemic score of +18.

Across areas, the “net gainers” score was highest among those in Metro Manila at +18 (from +2), followed by those in the rest of Luzon at +13 (from +12), the Visayas at +10 (from -14) and Mindanao at +2 (from +6).

In terms of educational attainment, it was highest among college graduates at +25 (from +20), followed by high school graduates at +17 (from +7), elementary graduates at -1 (from +1) and non-elementary graduates at +1 (from -1).

The survey had 1,500 respondents and a margin of error of plus/minus 2.5 percent for national percentages.