Something does not add up

Few days ago, a report on national television said inflation is now 5.7 percent, the highest in many years. The reporter said that as a result of this, the same amount of money at present would buy less goods compared to what it could before. He included footage of people complaining in markets. For ordinary mortals like me, inflation simply meant prices were getting higher. Indeed, the reporter confirmed that the price of rice shot up much higher than just few weeks ago. He then panned the camera to the vegetable section where eggplants now sold for near P50 a bunch from somewhere like P40.

Another newsman took a kindred story about oil prices saying the upward scale of oil prices was the nth time these past few weeks. Footage of jeepney drivers and private car owners lamenting accompanied the telecast. For jeepney drivers, the huge discrepancy in the money spent for diesel these last few weeks severely ate into their daily income. One of them even complained that before he used to bring home P400 plus after a day’s driving, now he can barely earn P300. Paradoxically, the sigh made by a car driving man in executive attire was no different. Demonstrably, the creases on their faces, while so complaining, told almost everything.

The business section of the same news program mentioned the diminishing exchange rate of the Philippine peso against the American dollar. Accordingly, we are experiencing the lowest peso value vis-a-vis the other currencies in about 10 years. The reporter said that today $1 is equivalent to P53 while a decade ago $1 was worth P47. Since our country is a net importer (meaning we import more than export), we now spend more to buy foreign goods than we did before. Consequently, when imported goods are sold in malls, they are more expensive than before.

The same program took the view of the country’s financial managers. They are supposed to know better than all of us. Their analysis of our situation was positive. I smiled hesitantly. There was, after all, a silver lining to the negative reports. Notwithstanding the inflation, spiraling oil prices, and diminution of the peso, they claimed our economy is robust. The country’s gross domestic product grew to a whopping 6.6 percent with only our agriculture in some kind of curable stagnancy. In other words, our economy is not ailing as it is the best performer in Asia next only to China and Vietnam! The failure to mention Singapore and Japan led me to believe we beat them if we talk about economic growth. Wow!

I admit that because my discipline is Law and not Economics, I did not understand the gobbledygook. The contexts of the program appeared to me to contain glaring irreconcilable contrasts. How could our country be among the region’s fastest-growing economies when majority of our citizenry can hardly make ends meet? Ask a call center agent who is the Filipino with a better income and I am sure his answer must be a revelation. In any case, the program that I watched carried “something that did not add up,” to borrow an American street expression.