Pinoy optimism hits highest level — SWS

Optimism of Filipinos about the quality of life and economic conditions in the next 12 months has hit the highest level, the latest Social Weather Stations (SWS) said on Thursday.

The survey results, which were first published in a national business newspaper, showed that the number of optimists or those who expected their quality of life to improve in the next 12 months increased to 39 percent.

This number was higher compared to the 36 percent in June and the 35 percent in March.

SWS said that the number of pessimists or those who expected the quality of life to worsen remained at October’s 9 percent level, which was a decline from 11 percent in the March survey.

Its latest survey yielded a “very high” net personal optimism score (the difference between optimists and pessimists) of +30 compared to the “high” levels of +27 in June and +24 in March surveys.

But the survey said that the current net optimism score was lower compared to the +35 in November and +32 September last year.

It added that net optimism over the economy’s prospects in 2012 jumped to the “very high” scores at +22 in the September survey from +14 in June and from “high” +4 in March.

The survey revealed that the number of Filipinos who expected the economy to worsen dropped to 14 percent from June’s 16 percent and March’s 24 percent while those who believed that it would improve grew to 35 percent from 29 percent and 27 percent previously.

SWS, however, said that the third-quarter net economic optimism score was below the +30 and +29 recorded in November and September 2011, respectively.

The number of gainers (those who believed that their quality of life improved over the past 12 months) hit 26 percent — highest percentage reported since the survey done under the Aquino administration, the survey said.

The number of losers (those who said that their lives worsened in the past year), decreased to 32 percent in the latest survey — the lowest this year but was still higher than those recorded in September and November last year.

The survey showed that people in the Visayas believed that their quality of life and economic conditions would worsen in 2012.

It said that the Visayas and Metro Manila noted that their net scores in terms of whether life improved or worsened fell further into negative territory in the survey.

The survey, which was conducted on September 4 to 7, 2011, used face-to-face interviews of 1,200 adults in Metro Manila, Balance of Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao and had margins of error of plus or minus 3 percent for national percentages and plus or minus 6 percent for area percentages.

SWS said that the survey was non-commissioned and conducted on its own initiative. –Jovee Marie N. Dela Cruz, Manila Times