THE recent increase in employment may not be enough to ensure higher incomes for Filipinos and guarantee the country’s recovery, according to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas .
“Oil and commodity market disruptions are already eroding purchasing power and can undermine the country’s efforts towards full recovery,” it added in its 2022 Financial Stability Report . “Unlike the national results, all deciles, except the first, experienced income losses. This is not unexpected, as the region accounts for a significant portion of the total Covid-19 cases and is therefore likely to feel the worst impact from the pandemic restrictions,” the FSR stated.
There was also a decline in food expenses among these households. It accounted for 58.2 percent of the total expenditure of families in the bottom 20 percent versus 31.9 percent in the upper 20 percent income group in the first semester of 2021. Recently, the purchasing power of the peso was at its weakest in four years as more expensive food and fuel caused inflation to accelerate to a 14-year high in 2022, according to data from the Philippine Statistics Authority .