(LONG VERSION) Towards A Better Normal - A Study On Inequalities and The Lack of Human Development in The Philippines - 0

RESEARCH PAPER OCTOBER 2020
Towards
a better
normal
A Study on Inequalities and the Lack
of Human Development in the Philippines1
JOSEPH ANTHONY LIM
1
This paper was completed in February 2020, when the COVID virus was not yet declared a global pandemic. In
the months that followed, the COVID pandemic came to dominate our lives, touching every aspect of human
development – from health, education, and social services, to the entire economy, which is heavily affected by
the lockdowns and the new physical distancing policies. The lack of human development, poverty,
unemployment and underemployment, as well as income disparities, will worsen and even threaten the social
fabric of many countries and economies. How the Philippines faces and tackles this grave challenge, and how
it can reshape its health and socio-political systems, as well as its economic system will determine how the
country becomes stronger, more resilient and more people-oriented.
1
This report was written to contribute to public debate and to invite feedback on development
and humanitarian policy issues. The views and recommendations expressed are those of the
author and not necessarily those of Oxfam.
For more information, or to comment on this paper, email infoph@oxfam.org.uk
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Joseph Anthony Lim is a professor of economics at the Ateneo de Manila University. He
obtained his Master of Science degree in Operations Research from Massachusetts Institute
of Technology, earned his PhD in Economics at University of Pennsylvania, and pursued post-
doctoral studies at University of Cambridge.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The additional research, editorial, and design support from Patricia Miranda, Dante
Dalabajan, Raul Redoblado, Erielle Esturas, and Ann Geron are also acknowledged.
2
Table of Contents
1. Introduction: Slow Growth in the Philippines’ Human Development Index (HDI)............................... 4
2. Glaring Regional Disparities – over 60% of national wealth is created in NCR and two nearby
regions ................................................................................................................................................................. 8
3. Income Inequality ........................................................................................................................................ 10

3.1. Philippines’ income inequality – we are not just poorer but also more unequal ............................................................................10
3.2 Income inequality in the Philippines: the richest get the lion’s share of the country’s income while the poor partake of
crumbs 12
3.3. Intra-Regional Income Inequality is declining, but the decline is no match for (Inter) Regional Disparities ..................................14
3.4. Unequal income distribution is worsening – the share of NCR keeps on increasing, while the rest of the regions lag behind ......15
4. Uneven Poverty Reduction Due to Regional Disparities: Many regions and provinces lag in
poverty reduction............................................................................................................................................ 15
4.1 At the regional level: Luzon regions improving more than Mindanao and Visayan regions; BARMM’s Poor is More Than 60% .15
4.2. At the provincial level, many regions in Mindanao and Visayas still have more than 30% poverty incidence while Sulu, La nao del
Sur, Basilan have more than 70% who are poor .....................................................................................................................................22
4.3. Declining rates of poverty in Luzon; alarming rise in Mindanao ......................................................................................................24
5. Problems on the Methodology of Determining Poverty and Poverty Thresholds ............................ 31
6. Gender Disparities ...................................................................................................................................... 32

6.1. Women have much lower labor force participation than men .........................................................................................................37
6.3. Maternal health and teenage pregnancies .....................................................................................................................................51
7. Vulnerability ............................................................................................................................................... 53
8. Multidimensional Poverty Index ............................................................................................................... 56
9. Ethnic Disparities........................................................................................................................................ 58
10. Conclusion: Drivers of Low Economic Development, Low Incomes and Serious Income
Inequality .......................................................................................................................................................... 58
11.1. A lack of industry policy and allowing markets and the private sector to determine the economic path ...............................58
11.2. Unfinished agrarian and urban reforms .........................................................................................................................................63
11.3. Conflict-prone areas are most affected........................................................................................................................................63
11.4. Regressive tax system ..................................................................................................................................................................64
11.5. Small base for domestic demand because of workers’ and peasants’ low incomes and the lack of industrial policy: an outdated
neoliberal approach ...............................................................................................................................................................................64
11. Recommendations: Hard Tasks Ahead ..................................................................................................... 66
References ........................................................................................................................................................ 68
3
1. Introduction: Slow Growth in the Philippines’
Human Development Index (HDI)
Human development is one of the generally accepted frameworks and approaches to
measuring development globally. The most widely used metric for measuring human
development is the Human Development Index (HDI), which is a composite of income per
capita (income component), mean and expected years of schooling (education component),
and life expectancy (health component). There are many other indices that directly and
indirectly measure human development such as the Gender Parity Index, and Human
Development Index, which this paper will discuss in a latter section.
The human development approach is anchored on the idea of universal basic human rights
— economic, social, and political basic rights for all people, present and future, to have the
capacity to achieve their full potential and targeted goals in life. Unfortunately, since free
trade and globalization were implemented in developing countries in the 1980s, the gap
between the economic and human development among countries has been tilted against
developing countries. Also, many ethnic and racial groups, discriminated social groups of
women and men, have shown slower human development than most of the population.
It should be noted that the world constantly changes due to improvements in technology
and economic development, and because of crises and recessions. The direction of human
development in developing countries is unclear. It may deteriorate further because of these
countries’ failure to compete in a globalized world, or it may present new opportunities and
challenges if institutions and policies – national and global – are changed for the better. For
example, the rigid neoliberalism and Washington Consensus of the 1980s and early 1990s,
have been replaced by more Keynesian policies and government intervention in economies
due to crises and the admission by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and
macroeconomists of mistakes made in the Asian Financial Crisis of 1997-98 and the Global
Financial Crisis in 2008-09.
The latter possibility opens up opportunities to reshape our national economy into a better
one, even after the current COVID pandemic. However, conservatism by many economists
and politicians, and a short-sighted view of the crisis may hinder the opportunities and
possibilities for us to turn this crisis into an impetus for change towards a better society with
social, political and economic systems that are more responsive to people living in the
margins of society.
Using data from 1990 to 2018, the Philippines is compared to a group of Asian economies
(Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and
Vietnam). The economies were chosen because they were middle- or low-income countries
of East or South Asia, and all have some form of industrial sector.
4
Figures 1 and 2 show that the Philippines had the slowest growth in HDI among all the
countries. A more technical discussion is found in Box 1. The HDI of the Philippines is pulled
down by low life expectancy, unlike other countries such as Bangladesh and Vietnam,
which have lower incomes per capita.
Figure 1. Human Development Index and its components

for selected Asian countries
120
100
80
60
40
20
0
Philippines Sri Lanka Malaysia Thailand Indonesia Viet Nam India Cambodia China Lao PDR Bangladesh
Life expectance at birth Expected years of schooling Mean years of schooling
Life expectancy is affected not only by the levels of income, nutrition, and lifestyle, but also
by the legal determinants of health such as programs and policies for preventive and curative
health care, the quality of health care facilities and institutions and their availability to the
lower and middle-income groups.
Life expectancy is also influenced by access to social insurance and safety nets –
particularly health insurance and free social services – for those who cannot afford them,
and the availability of cheap medicines to the general public. Understanding the socio-
economic determinants of health is essential for both policymakers and primary care
providers, because it enables a more holistic and comprehensive approach to healthcare
provisions, especially for people living in poverty.
The Philippines’ HDI is also dragged down by high rates of infant mortality and maternal
mortality. The slower improvement in HDI involves not only differential access to income
(those who lack the income to sustain basic needs are usually said to be in poverty), but also
differential access to social and economic services (especially health, education, housing,
water and sanitation, transportation, electricity), differential access to social insurance and
safety nets, and regional, gender and ethnic disparities.
5
Although the HDI for education appears rosy, we find that it might be over-estimated. The
mean and expected years of schooling went up in 2017, but mainly because of the K-12
program (which added three more years of high school), a program which has not yet been
evaluated thoroughly. Moreover, the education index component in HDI does not measure the
quality of education. Results of the 2018 Program for International Student Assessment
(PISA), carried out by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD),
showed Filipinos faring the worst among 79 countries in reading literacy and the second-
lowest in both mathematical and scientific literacy.
6
Box 1 Technical Discussion – Slow Human Development growth of the Philippines
Fig. 2 shows the Philippines’ Human Development Indices (HDI’s) from 1990 to 2018, compared to those
of selected Asian countries. The figures are taken from the Human Development Report 2019. In 1990,
the Philippines had the third highest HDI among the countries in the figure, and the second highest in
Southeast Asia. But by 2018, the Philippines had been overtaken by China and Thailand and was only
slightly ahead of Indonesia and Vietnam. One can see clearly from the graph that the Philippines was
the slowest growing country in terms of HDI (the curve with the flattest slope). The HDIs of all the other
countries (using the numbers in Figure 1) were growing faster than that of the Philippines, as shown
below (from highest growth to lowest growth):
Figure 2. Growth rate of HDI from 1990 to 2018
Bangladesh 58.25
Lao PDR 51.38
China 51.3
Cambodia 51.3
India 50.12
Viet Nam 45.89
Indonesia 34.67
Thailand 33.28
Malaysia 24.84
Sri Lanka 24.8
Philippines 20.68
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Even in the period 2012-2018, when the Philippines’ gross domestic product (GDP) was growing at an
average of more than 6%, the Philippines’ HDI was still growing slowly as Figure 1 shows. Table 1 tells us
that it was mainly the health indicator -- life expectancy -- that pulled down the Philippines’ HDI. The
Philippines’ life expectancy of around 71 years was at par with Indonesia and lower than those with lower
income per capita compared to the Philippines such as Vietnam and Bangladesh.
The column of GNI (gross national income) per capita rank minus HDI rank is negative for the Philippines
(and many other countries in the table), which means that the HDI rank is lower than the GNI per capita
rank. Although the number is small (-1), it could actually be a bigger negative number because it is likely
that there is overestimation of the Philippines’ education index, as explained in the main text. This is in
contrast with Vietnam and Bangladesh, whose HDI rank was much better than their GNI per capita rank.
The difference implies that in the case of Vietnam and Bangladesh, other variables (such as life
expectancy, schooling) are pulling up their HDI rank over their income ranking, while the Philippines is
being pulled down by life expectancy. Thus, even if Vietnam’s GNI per capita was much lower than that
of the Philippines, its HDI index and rank are very near those of the Philippines.
7
2. Glaring Regional Disparities – over 60% of national
wealth is created in NCR and two nearby regions
The Philippines’ low HDI growth compared to selected Asian countries is aggravated by
glaring regional disparities, with many poor regions and provinces lagging in economic
development and poverty reduction. The staggering regional disparities mean that majority
of the provinces have worse HDI indicators than those shown in Figures 1 and 2.
This study used per capita Gross Regional Domestic Product (GRDP) at constant 2000 prices
from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) to do a first analysis of regional disparities. Per
capita GRDP can be interpreted as the value of output per capita (or per person) of each
region, or, alternatively, an approximate estimate of the income per capita of each region.
Figure 3 shows regions’ per capita GRDP. From 2009 to 2018, only three regions – National
Capital Region (NCR or Metro Manila), CALABARZON (or Region IV-A), and Cordillera
Administrative Region (CAR) – had higher per capita GRDP than the national average for the
Philippines. All the other regions had lower GRDP per capita.
Figure 3. Per Capita Gross Regional Domestic Product, at Constant 2000 Prices
300000
PHILIPPINES
NCR
CALABARZON 250000
CAR
Central Luzon
Davao Region 200000
Central Visayas
Northern Mindanao
Ilocos Region 150000
SOCCSKSARGEN
Western Visayas
Zamboanga Peninsula 100000
MIMAROPA
Cagayan Valley
Eastern Visayas 50000
Caraga
Bicol Region)
BARMM 0
2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
8
Figure 4 shows the large gap between NCR and the other regions. The ratio of per capita GRDP
with the per capita GRDP of NCR was calculated (in percent) and presented again in
descending order. The next richest region to NCR is CALABARZON, whose per capita GRDP is
only 41.2% of NCR’s in 2018. The other regions, of course, are far lower in terms of GRDP
contribution. At the bottom lies BARMM, which derived only less than 8.5% of NCR’s per capita
GRDP in 2018, while Bicol derived less than 13%, and Caraga derived only 15%. One way to
illustrate this disparity is that for every P100 earned in Metro Manila, the counterpart in
BARMM is a measly P6.
Source: Calculated from Philippine Statistics Authority, Annual Per Capita Gross Regional Development Product data, www.psa.gov.ph
In the COVID pandemic, urban centers like NCR, Cebu City, and Davao City, and the more
prosperous regions of Central Luzon, CALABARZON, and Central and Western Visayas, have
been hit hard, with the harsh economic downturn affecting the richer areas more than
agricultural, rural and poorer areas. The poorer agricultural provinces are still expected to
suffer due to lower demand from the urban centers, and the restrictions on the value chains
caused by the lockdowns. The result may reduce regional disparities, but in a very negative
way: a strong crash in the economies of the richer urban and growth centers, and a smaller
decline in the economies of the poorer and agricultural regions. At any rate, both areas will
see their incomes reduced.
9
3. Income Inequality
The large regional disparities inevitably lead to income inequality, and this study shows
precisely how:
3.1. Philippines’ income inequality – we are not just poorer but also more unequal
Gini coefficient is the standard tool for measuring income inequality or wealth inequality
within a nation by measuring the statistical dispersion of income across income deciles. A
Gini coefficient of zero connotes perfect equality where everyone has the same income. In
practical terms, however, national incomes typically fall within the range of 0.25 (25%) to
0.65 (65%). In Figure 5, the inequality in the Philippines is compared with those of the
countries mentioned earlier using the Gini coefficient. The table reveals that the Philippines
is the third most unequal country in the group, after Malaysia and China. (See Box 2 for a more
technical discussion and explanation). Malaysia and China are countries with much higher
economic development than the Philippines and are rated as high medium-income countries
by the World Bank (WB). Their HDI values are much higher than the Philippines (see Figure 1),
and their poverty has been reduced to a single-digit percentage. The Philippines is still a low
middle-income country, according to the WB, with double-digit poverty incidence. The
Philippines is much more unequal than Sri Lanka and Indonesia and poorer countries such as
Vietnam, India, Bangladesh, and Lao PDR.
10
Figure 5. Income Inequality Indices: Selected Asian Countries
Malaysia
50
45
Bangladesh 40 China
35
30
25
20
15
Viet Nam 10 Philippines
5
0
Lao People's Democratic

Sri Lanka
Republic
Thailand Indonesia
11
3.2 Income inequality in the Philippines: the richest get the lion’s share of the
country’s income while the poor partake of crumbs
Figure 6 shows the income inequality in the Philippines among decile groups. It shows the
percentage of income captured by the poorest 10%, the next poorest 10% and so on up to
the richest 10% (10 deciles in total). In 2015, 30% of the country’s income went to the richest
10%, with the richest 20% amassing almost half (45.1%) of the country’s income. Meanwhile,
only 7.5% of the country’s income went to the poorest 20%. With the use of 2018 figures,
Figure 7 shows that the total income per capita of the richest 10% of the population is more
than seven times that of the poorest 10%. The expenditure per capita of the richest 10% is
five times that of the poorest 10%. The savings per capita of the richest 10% is 80.5 times
that of the poorest 10%, which shows that the poorest decile can hardly save. In 2018,
savings was only P4,000 per person annually, while that of the richest 10% is P322,000 per
person annually. There is much room for improvement in the country’s income distribution.
The decline in income, employment and economic opportunities brought about by the COVID-
19 pandemic and subsequent lockdowns is expected to cause a deterioration in poverty,
income distribution and human development. Already the lockdown from March to May has
brought an unprecedented 16.5% decline in the second quarter GDP of 2020, and more than
9% decline in the first semester of 2020.
12
Figure 6. Percentage Distribution of Total Family Income By Income Decile
2003, 2006, 2009, 2012, and 2015
100
90
80
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
2003 2006 2009 2012 2015
First decile Second decile Third decile Fourth decile Fifth decile
Sixth decile Seventh decile Eighth decile Ninth decile Tenth decile
Source: Human Development Indices and Indicators, hdr.undp.org › sites › default › files › statistical_annex_all
Figure 7. Average Income, Average Expenditure and Average Savings of

Families, at Current Prices, by Per Capita Income Decile,
Philippines : 2018
2000
1800
1600
1400
1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
First Decile Second Third Fourth Fifth DecileSixth Decile Seventh Eighth Ninth Tenth
Decile Decile Decile Decile Decile Decile Decile
Income Expenditure Savings
Source: Philippine Statistics Authority, 2015 and 2018 Family Income and Expenditure Survey
13
3.3. Intra-Regional Income Inequality is declining, but the decline is no match for
(Inter) Regional Disparities
The inequalities within the regions are presented in Figure 8 by their Gini coefficients. It is
interesting to note that the poorest region BARMM2 has the smallest and, over the years, the
most improved Gini coefficient(0.28 for BARMM in 2018, compared to 0.43 for the Philippines),
which could be misinterpreted to mean that it is the most equal region in the Philippines. It
only means that since BARMM gets a very small slice of the economic pie, every person in
BARMM gets a tiny slice.
Figure 8. Gini Coefficient by Regions 2000-2018

0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
BARMM
Central Visayas
Caraga
Western Visayas
Caraga
Cagayan Valley
Bicol Region
MIMAROPA
Davao
Zamboanga Peninsula
SOCCSKSARGEN 2
NCR
CALABARZON
Eastern Visayas
Northern Mindanao
Central Luzon
Philippines
Ilocos
2003 2006 2009 2012 2015 2018
Source: Philippine Statistics Authority, Chapter 2, Income and Prices, 2017 Philippine Statistical Yearbook
https://psa.gov.ph/products-and-services/publications/philippine-statistical-yearbook
The poverty picture that will be shown later indicates BARMM’s poverty incidence has gone
up to more than 60% of the population. Among the other regions, the next most improved
and smallest Gini coefficient (next most equal region) is NCR, the richest region (0.35 in 2018).
This presents a paradox. One way to explain this paradox is that the big part of national
2
Note: The times series data that we analyzed dates as far back as ARMM, i.e. before BARMM came into being
in 2019.
14
income is created in and circulates within NCR, while in regions like BARMM, the income is so
small that each person receives also a very small portion of the income.
The most unequal regions are: Cordillera Administrative Region (CAR), Eastern Visayas,
Central Visayas, Northern Mindanao, SOCCKSKARGEN (South Cotabato, Cotabato, Sultan
Kudarat, Sarangani and General Santos) and MIMAROPA (Mindoro, Marinduque, Romblon and
Palawan). Only CAR, Central Visayas and Northern Mindanao are relatively higher-income
regions compared to the other unequal regions.
3.4. Unequal income distribution is worsening – the share of NCR keeps on

increasing, while the rest of the regions lag behind
This paper’s analysis shows that the cause of the relatively poor income distribution
performance of the Philippines compared to other Asian countries may be mainly due to
regional disparities. The intra-regional Gini coefficients are improving over time (i.e., regions
are getting slightly more equal over time) for most regions. But Figure 4 shows very clearly
that each region’s GRDP per capita ratio to that of NCR is falling over time and that regional
disparities are worsening. Thus, the potential of the Philippines’ improvement in income
distribution has been hampered by substantial regional disparities, and more growth needs
to happen in regions outside the NCR so that more income will get distributed.
4. Uneven Poverty Reduction Due to Regional Disparities:

Many regions and provinces lag in poverty reduction
4.1 At the regional level: Luzon regions improving more than Mindanao and
Visayan regions; BARMM’s Poor is More Than 60%
Despite consistent declines in poverty incidence from 2012 to 2018, poverty reduction has
been very uneven, and many regions and provinces are lagging in poverty reduction. This
trend is expected to continue due to the persistently large regional disparities and NCR-
centric economic growth of the country. Figures 9 and Table 1 show that many regions and
provinces are lagging in the efforts to reduce poverty. See Box 3 for a more detailed
discussion of how Figure 9 was constructed. Table 1 is constructed similar to Figure 9,
except that provinces were used instead of regions.
Very clearly, Figure 9 shows that all Mindanao and Visayan regions, except for Region VI
(Western Visayas), have higher poverty incidences than the national average poverty
incidence of 16.6% in 2018. All other Luzon regions have lower poverty incidences than the
national average, except Region V (Bicol Region), which has a worse poverty incidence than
the national average. Even the supposedly thriving Cebu region (Region VII) and Davao Region
(Region XI) performed worse than the national average. This means Region VII’s luster is
15
mainly concentrated in Metro Cebu and that of Region XI is only in the Davao City-Tagum
areas.
The poverty incidence in BARMM is a particular cause of concern as it has deteriorated

remarkably over the years. The poverty incidence in BARMM soared from 30.5% in 1991 to
more than 50% in 2015, and then to 61.3% in 2018, which means that more people in BARMM
are now living below the poverty line. This trend illustrates the chicken-and-egg paradox of
whether the armed conflict in the region is giving rise to the lack of development or vice
versa.
Figure 9. Poverty Incidence in the Regions and the Philippines

in Ascending Order of Poverty Incidence of the Population in 2018
70
PHILIPPINES
NCR
60
Central Luzon
CALABARZON
Ilocos 50
CAR
MIMAROPA
Cagayan Valley 40
Western Visayas
Central Visayas
30
Davao
Northern Mindanao
Bicol 20
SOCCSKSARGEN
Caraga
10
Eastern Visayas
Zamboanga Peninsula
BARMM 0
1991 2006 2009 2012 2015 2018
16
Table 1 Poverty Incidence Among Population by Provinces (2006 – 2018)
Poverty
Incidence
Poverty Incidence
among Province
among Population (%)
Province Population Province
(%)
2006 2009 2012 2015 2015* 2018*
NCR 4.7 3.6 3.9 3.9 NCR 4.1 2.3
Pampanga 2.7 6.9 7.6 4.9 Pampanga 4.4 2.8
Laguna 5.5 8.4 6.4 5.4 Laguna 4.9 3.9
La Union 26.0 29.3 18.5 12.2 La Union 17.5 4.4
Rizal 3.3 8.6 6.1 5.4 Rizal 6.1 4.5
Ilocos Norte 17.7 14.7 9.9 5.3 Ilocos Norte 8 4.7
Bulacan 7.3 6.9 7.3 4.5 Bulacan 4 5
Cavite 1.8 3.2 3.4 6.8 Cavite 9 5.3
Benguet 5.8 6.1 3.7 3.5 Benguet 3.5 6
Capiz 29.9 29.0 27.8 12.9 Capiz 11.7 6.3
Ilocos Sur 20.8 18.1 17.3 12.1 Ilocos Sur 13.9 7.5
Bataan 9.7 7.7 7.1 2.0 Bataan 1.2 7.9
Nueva Ecija 26.5 29.9 25.2 22.6 Nueva Ecija 20.3 8.5
Guimaras 25.3 20.7 25.2 5.2 Guimaras 5.2 9.3
Batanes 16.6 14.4 33.3 0.0 Batanes 13.7 9.7
Tarlac 18.1 17.5 16.6 18.1 Tarlac 16.8 10.3
Siquijor 22.7 31.0 32.6 52.9 Siquijor 51 10.4
Oriental Oriental
43.7 36.1 29.3 21.6 21.3 10.6
Mindoro Mindoro
Batangas 14.4 17.1 19.0 9.3 Batangas 21.4 11.2
Davao del Sur 23.7 24.8 24.4 15.6 Davao del Sur 13.8 11.7
Aklan 41.8 44.7 25.0 14.9 Aklan 16.1 12.1
Kalinga 47.3 30.1 26.8 34.9 Kalinga 40.7 12.4
Quirino 14.6 15.6 21.2 26.5 Quirino 28.4 12.5
Palawan 35.2 30.9 26.4 17.0 Palawan 17.6 12.5
Pangasinan 28.7 22.3 20.4 15.3 Pangasinan 22.8 12.7
Quezon 33.5 29.8 27.5 22.7 Quezon 24.4 13.4
Davao del Davao del
31.7 32.0 33.4 33.2 31 13.4
Norte Norte
Ifugao 28.0 32.1 42.4 32.5 Ifugao 42.4 14.5
Cebu 30.4 26.8 22.7 21.4 Cebu 23.6 14.6
Marinduque 40.5 33.6 32.9 16.2 Marinduque 16.9 14.7
Zambales 23.6 17.3 16.0 16.8 Zambales 16.8 15
Nueva Nueva
15.0 13.3 20.7 13.6 15.4 15.7
Vizcaya Vizcaya
Misamis Misamis
32.0 28.9 23.4 19.3 21.2 15.7
Oriental Oriental
Aurora 30.5 18.2 30.8 26.3 Aurora 33.8 16
17
Poverty
Incidence
Poverty Incidence
among Province
(%)
2006 2009 2012 2015 2015* 2018*
Iloilo 21.8 26.6 26.2 20.0 Iloilo 21.5 16.4
PHILIPPINES 26.6 26.3 25.2 21.6 Philippines 23.3 16.6
Isabela 29.6 28.9 24.4 15.2 Isabela 17.8 16.7
South South
31.7 31.6 32.0 24.6 22.9 18
Cotabato Cotabato
Abra 49.3 48.8 37.4 28.9 Abra 28.9 19.2
Negros Negros
28.2 30.4 32.3 29.0 33 19.5
Occidental Occidental
Antique 51.6 44.3 30.9 26.0 Antique 26 19.6
Apayao 46.8 45.7 61.4 34.9 Apayao 43.3 19.7
Biliran 29.8 39.2 27.5 21.3 Biliran 21.3 19.7
Catanduanes 41.4 29.1 33.8 43.4 Catanduanes 43.4 20.3
Bohol 48.2 43.7 36.8 26.0 Bohol 30.5 20.6
Albay 36.4 36.7 41.0 25.2 Albay 26 20.9
43.2 35.9 38.1 41.2 41.7 21.8
Mindoro Mindoro
Tawi-tawi 52.4 35.3 28.6 12.6 Tawi-tawi 17 21.8
Southern Southern
33.7 43.1 43.3 38.0 40.9 23.6
Leyte Leyte
Camiguin 34.6 25.5 53.6 34.0 Camiguin 36.1 23.6
Zamboanga Zamboanga
31.7 31.6 32.0 24.8 25 23.8
del Sur del Sur
Mt. Province 44.1 52.2 37.6 39.0 Mt. Province 44.7 24.8
Agusan del Agusan del
44.1 45.9 34.7 34.9 32.7 24.8
Norte Norte
Compostela Compostela
37.7 36.6 36.7 28.1 26.7 25.1
Valley Valley
Negros Negros
42.9 33.2 50.1 45.0 42.5 25.3
Oriental Oriental
Surigao Del Surigao Del
46.5 53.7 36.0 40.1 40.6 25.3
Sur Sur
Lanao del Lanao del
40.7 46.2 49.1 44.3 44.8 25.9
Norte Norte
Sorsogon 41.2 39.3 40.7 41.3 Sorsogon 55.9 26
Misamis Misamis
44.0 46.5 42.8 36.9 45.1 26.7
Bukidnon 43.6 46.0 49.0 53.6 Bukidnon 53.7 27.5
Romblon 46.1 41.9 40.5 36.6 Romblon 37.3 28.1
Camarines Camarines
47.8 47.9 41.2 35.2 36.8 28.1
Sur Sur
Leyte 38.4 36.3 39.2 31.0 Leyte 32.7 28.6
18
Poverty
Incidence
Poverty Incidence
among Province
(%)
2006 2009 2012 2015 2015* 2018*
Western Western
40.4 42.5 50.0 46.9 49.2 29
Samar Samar
North North
31.4 30.6 52.4 41.4 43.2 29.1
Cotabato Cotabato
Camarines Camarines
41.1 41.8 28.7 36.4 42.3 30.5
Norte Norte
Sultan Sultan
52.0 51.5 48.5 48.0 49.8 31.5
Kudarat Kudarat
Dinagat
43.5 32.8
Island
Masbate 53.6 56.3 51.3 45.4 Masbate 45.4 33
Northern Northern
53.4 52.1 50.2 56.2 59.9 34
Samar Samar
52.7 57.9 41.8 34.7 37.2 34
Norte Norte
Zamboanga Zamboanga
50.7 52.7 44.8 31.7 36.3 35.5
Sibugay Sibugay
Davao Davao
50.5 54.4 45.8 29.9 31.1 37.7
Oriental Oriental
53.8 60.0 48.1 47.3 47.3 37.7
Sur Sur
Davao
57.9 39.6
Occidental
Saranggani 49.0 57.7 53.2 55.2 Sarangani 53.5 42
Cotabato City 34.4 34.0 44.3 31.6 Cotabato City 48.7 42.6
Zamboanga Zamboanga
65.5 68.5 54.4 51.6 60.3 45.3
del Norte del Norte
Maguindanao 54.6 52.2 63.7 57.2 Maguindanao 53.9 47.8
Eastern Eastern
51.3 56.4 63.7 46.3 51.5 49.5
Samar Samar
Isabela City 41.9 27.4 22.1 25.1 Isabela City 30.2 50.1
Lanao del Sur 44.7 56.6 73.8 71.9 Lanao del Sur 76.6 71.2
Basilan 39.0 36.6 41.2 37.0 Basilan 45.5 72.8
Sulu 40.7 41.6 45.8 54.9 Sulu 68.1 81.8
*In the latest FIES analysis, poverty thresholds for 2015 and 2018 were raised in the last two columns
Source: Philippine Statistics Authority, www.psa.gov.ph
19
But during this COVID pandemic period, income inequality within each area is expected to
worsen significantly. The lockdowns have resulted in severe unemployment and hunger
among the working class. Again, the poor are the most hard-hit. During the Enhanced
Community Quarantine (ECQ), income sources of those in the informal economy as good as
disappeared. In the formal economy, practically all jobs stopped except those in hospitals,
banks, pharmacies, and food markets, though most of these were employing only skeleton
staff.
Up to now, with General Community Quarantine (GCQ) in place, many businesses are closed or
only operating with skeleton staff because of the need for social distancing and other
practices to fight the pandemic. The sharp recession and the big spending of the government
for health and economic rehabilitation, will cost the economy many trillions of pesos. But
more importantly, the human suffering, deaths, poverty, and hunger that have affected the
entire country will go down as a very dark period in modern history. The government’s
reaction to the crisis will determine whether the Philippines can beat the pandemic and
rebuild the economy into a more resilient, pro-poor and efficient one. The prioritization of
20
Box 2: Technical Aspects of the Poverty
Figure 9 shows the poverty incidence of the population for the years 1991, 2006, 2009, 2012, 2015
and 2018. Households falling below the poverty (income) threshold determined by the PSA are
considered poor. The poverty threshold is calculated per region based on the food threshold or
the cost of maintaining a minimum acceptable nutritional standard pro-rated by a factor for other
expenses. The poverty threshold or poverty line is what the PSA estimates as the minimum income
a household needs to survive adequately. The data sets from Figure 9 have two columns for 2015.
In December 2019, the PSA revealed a revised and increased poverty income threshold (or poverty
line) for 2015. Increasing the poverty threshold or poverty line will increase the incidence of
poverty since it will take more income for households to survive adequately. Because of this,
estimates of poverty incidence were revised upwards from 21.6% to 23.3% in 2015. The 2018
poverty threshold was based on the new 2015 poverty threshold. Thus, the 2018 statistics is only
comparable to the statistics in the second 2015 column. It was estimated at 16.6% in 2018.
Figure 9 presents poverty incidence in all regions and the Philippines. NCR is seen as the region
with the lowest poverty incidence. It can be seen that poverty incidence of 2.3% in NCR is
improbable – a point that will be elaborated later. Next to NCR are CALABARZON, Ilocos Region and
CAR, in that order.
MIMAROPA, Cagayan Valley, and, Western Visayas all have poverty incidence worse than the
national average in 2018.
Figure 9 also shows Central Visayas, Davao Region, Northern Mindanao, Bicol, SOCCSKARGEN,
Caraga, Eastern Visayas, Zamboanga Peninsula and BARMM regions have worse poverty incidence
than the national average. The latter mentioned regions are poorer than the earlier mentioned
ones. BARMM is the poorest region in the country. Its poverty incidence deteriorated from 58.9%
in 2015 to 61.3% in 2018. CALABARZON, which has second lowest poverty incidence, Ilocos, CAR,
MIMAROPA, Cagayan Valley, and Western Visayas all have poverty incidence lower than the
national average in 2018. Data shows that Central Visayas, Davao Region, Northern Mindanao,
Bicol, SOCCSKARGEN, Caraga, Eastern Visayas, Zamboanga Peninsula, and BARMM have worse
poverty incidence than the national average of the Philippines. The PSA is rebasing the poverty
figures to 2018 consumption prices, which may increase the estimated poverty incidence of
2018.
the executive and legislative branches on establishing an anti-terror law, despite the
alarming health and economic damages that are happening, is not very encouraging.
21
4.2. At the provincial level, many regions in Mindanao and Visayas still have more
than 30% poverty incidence while Sulu, Lanao del Sur, Basilan have more than 70%
who are poor
Table 2 shows the provinces again in ascending order of poverty incidence among the
population in 2018. It is arranged as such so that the table can distinguish the provinces
with poverty incidence below the Philippine average and those above the Philippine average.
In 2018, there were 35 provinces whose poverty incidences were below (less poor compared
to) the Philippine average in 2018, and there were 48 provinces with poverty incidences
above (i.e., poorer compared to) the national average.
Table 2 Percent of Total Population Below Poverty Threshold, By Regions (1991 – 2018)
Region 1991 2006 2009 2012 2015 Region 2015* 2018

PHILIPPINES 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 PHILIPPINES 100.0 100.0
ARMM 2.9 6.4 6.5 7.8 9.1 ARMM 9.5 14.0
Region V 11.3 10.1 10.0 9.6 9.9 Region V 9.7 9.2
Region VIII 7.6 7.2 7.3 7.9 8.0 Region VIII 7.8 8.1
Region VII 9.0 10.0 8.8 8.8 9.4 Region VII 9.1 7.7
Region XII 5.6 6.2 6.5 8.0 7.8 Region XII 7.4 7.7
Region VI 10.4 8.6 9.1 8.8 7.9 Region VI 7.8 7.2
Region IX 4.2 6.3 6.5 5.9 5.8 Region IX 5.8 6.9
Region X 6.5 6.8 7.1 7.4 7.8 Region X 7.7 6.4
Region IV-A 6.7 5.0 6.1 6.0 5.9 Region IV-A 7.5 6.2
Region XI 5.2 5.6 5.8 5.9 5.0 Region XI 4.9 5.5
Caraga 4.5 5.0 5.5 4.2 4.8 Caraga 4.4 4.7
Region III 6.4 5.4 5.7 5.6 5.7 Region III 4.9 4.7
Region II 4.7 3.6 3.4 3.0 2.5 Region II 2.6 3.3
Region I 6.0 5.1 4.3 3.7 3.1 Region I 4.0 2.9
Region IV-B 3.8 4.6 4.0 3.7 3.4 Region IV-B 3.1 2.7
NCR 2.9 2.2 1.7 1.9 2.3 NCR 2.2 1.8
CAR 2.4 1.7 1.7 1.6 1.6 CAR 1.7 1.2
% Poor % Poor
from Luzon 44.1 37.8 36.9 35.2 34.3 from Luzon 35.8 31.8
% Poor % Poor
from from
Visayas 27.1 25.8 25.2 25.5 25.3 Visayas 24.7 23.0
% Poor % Poor
from from
Mindanao 28.9 36.4 37.9 39.3 40.4 Mindanao 39.5 45.1
Source: Calculated from poverty statistics in Philippine Statistics Authority, www.psa.gov.ph
22
The three poorest provinces in the country are all in BARMM, with staggering rates of poverty
in 2018 — Sulu (81.8%), Basilan (72.8%), and Lanao del Sur (71.2%). Several other provinces
and cities have poverty incidence above 50%, such as Isabela City in the Zamboanga
Peninsula and Eastern Samar in Eastern Visayas. Maguindanao and Zamboanga del Norte
have more than 45% of the population classified as poor, while Sarangani and Cotabato City
have around 42% to 43% of their people considered poor.
Camarines Norte, Northern Samar, Leyte, Zamboanga del Sur, Zamboanga Sibugay, Lanao del
Norte, Davao Occidental, Davao Oriental are provinces with more than 30% of the population
classified as poor. The Philippines had an official poverty incidence above 30% in 1991, when
the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) challenge started. It can be argued, then, that the
incidence of poverty in these provinces has not budged over the past three decades, and for
some, like Sulu, Basilan and Lanao del Norte, poverty incidence has worsened.
Clearly, these data show that the growth period from 2012 to 2019 has largely been
concentrated in and has only benefited mostly the growth areas and middle-income
provinces and regions. About a third of the country’s population are being left behind with
poverty incidence at 30% to 81%.
These provinces are concentrated in Mindanao, especially Muslim Mindanao, and typhoon-
prone provinces in Bicol and Eastern Visayas, which find themselves in a vicious cycle of
poverty, disasters and suffering.
23
4.3. Declining rates of poverty in Luzon; alarming rise in Mindanao
Because of the uneven poverty reduction in the country favoring most of Luzon’s provinces,
Luzon’s share in total poverty (the percentage of people from Luzon in the total poor
population) has been falling significantly over time, while that of Mindanao has been
alarmingly on the rise.
Table 3 illustrates this, using the PSA’s published magnitude of the poor population for each
region to calculate each region’s share of poor people in the total number of poor people in
the Philippines. The table is arranged in descending order starting from the region with the
highest contribution of poor people to the total. The stark green highlighted regions are the
regions from Luzon. The regions in light green are regions of the Visayas, and regions
highlighted in pallid green are the regions from Mindanao.
A region contributes a high share of poor people due to: a) high poverty incidence, or b) the
region has a very big population, so naturally should contribute more to the number of poor
people, or, c) a combination of the first two.
The regions contributing least to the total poor in the country are the Luzon regions at the
bottom of the table. The only Luzon region that is poor and contributing significantly to
poverty is the Bicol Region. CALABARZON is one of the growth areas but has a sizeable
population. This is why it is found in the middle of the table.
The region contributing most to the share of poor people is BARMM, with its contribution
growing from 2.9% in 1991 to 14% in 2018. The second region contributing most to the
number of poor people in the Philippines is the Bicol Region, but its share in the total poor
has gone down from 11.3% in 1991 to 9.2% in 2018. Eastern Visayas is the third biggest
contributor to poverty in 2018, growing slightly from 7.6% in 1991 to 8.1% in 2018.
Table 3 clearly illustrates that Mindanao regions are faring worst. SOCCSKSARGEN Region
increased its share contribution to poor people from 5.6% in 1991 to 7.7% in 2018.
Zamboanga Peninsula increased its share from 4.2% in 1991 to 6.9% in 2018. Other Mindanao
Regions, such as Davao and Caraga, did not reduce their share of the total of the country’s
poor with their shares having slightly increased or remaining almost constant.
The biggest concentration of people in poverty was in Mindanao, with about 28.9% of the
poor in 1991; this continuously went up to reach 45.1% of the total poor in 2018. Yet, its
population is only 23.7% relative to the country’s total. Its share contribution to poverty was
almost double its share in the population. And as Figure 11 shows, Mindanao’s share of
poverty grew bigger and bigger over time.
Table 4 shows similar results in terms of the provinces. Note that there was only one Luzon
province among the top 12 contributors to poverty (Camarines Sur in Bicol, the poorest region
in Luzon). The majority were from Mindanao and the rest were from the Visayas. Cebu,
24
Negros Occidental and Iloilo in the Visayas were in the top 12 because they are more
populous provinces. There are patches of poverty in the three provinces, especially outside
Metro Cebu, Iloilo City and Bacolod City. But the very poor provinces in the top 12 were the
provinces of Lanao del Sur, Sulu, Maguindanao, Leyte, Camarines Sur, Zamboanga del Norte,
Zamboanga del Sur, North Cotabato and Bukidnon; seven of these are in Mindanao.
The Luzon provinces can be found towards the bottom of the table, meaning they are only a
small contributor to poverty. (The least of the contributors were small islands or island
groups which have small populations: Batanes, Siquijor, Guimaras and Camiguin). But among
the more populous areas, NCR contributed only 1.8% of the total poor even if it has at least
11 million people or 12.7% of the country’s population.
Overall, poverty in Mindanao looked much worse at the provincial and regional levels than the
regional performance presented in the earlier per capita GRDP tables . Non-income variables
such as access to essential social services (health, education, housing and transportation);
peace and order variables, neglect of the national and local governments in terms of
infrastructure, governance and socio-economic guidance are variables not captured simply
by the per capita GRDP figures.
Table 4 shows the human development components for the various provinces in the
Philippines in 2015. Provinces are presented in descending order of HDI with the high
performing provinces at the top. Although there are differences in the ranking and measures
of HDI and the poverty incidences of the provinces in Table 10 (note that the latest HDI set
of data is 2015, while the poverty data includes 2018), the general observation is the same.
The Luzon provinces were doing well, and the Mindanao provinces were doing much worse.
Mindanao provinces are at the bottom of the HDI ranking – Lanao del Sur, Sulu, Maguindanao,
Sarangani, Bukidnon, Basilan, Zamboanga del Norte, Tawi-Tawi, Agusan del Sur, North
Cotobato –while Benguet, NCR, Laguna, Rizal, Bataan and Pampanga in Luzon are among
those with the best HDI indices. Compared to an average life expectancy of 71 for the
Philippines in 2015, the life expectancies of 62.6 years in Tawi-Tawi, 63 years in Sulu, below
68 years in Agusan del Sur, Sorsogon, Surigao del Sur, and Camarines Sur in the Mindanao
and Bicol regions are quite disturbing.
The findings in the previous sections are expected to worsen due to the COVID-19 lockdowns.
This will be discussed in more detail in a final section at the end of the paper.
25
Table 3 Percent of Total Population Below Poverty Threshold, By Province:
1991, 2006, 2009, 2012, 2015 and 2018
Provinces 2006 2009 2012 2015 Provinces 2015* 2018

Philippines 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0 Philippines 100.0 100.0
Lanao del Sur 1.6 2.2 2.9 3.3 Lanao del Sur 3.3 4.5
Cebu 5.2 4.8 4.2 4.5 Cebu 4.6 4.1
Sulu 1.2 1.3 1.5 2.6 Sulu 3.1 4.1
Negros Negros
3.4 3.8 4.0 4.0 4.1 3.5
Maguindanao 2.1 2.0 2.4 2.5 Maguindanao 2.3 3.4
Leyte 3.0 2.7 3.0 3.0 Leyte 2.9 3.3
Camarines Sur 3.6 3.7 3.3 3.0 Camarines Sur 2.8 3.2
Zamboanga del Zamboanga
2.6 2.8 2.2 2.7 2.8 2.7
Norte del Norte
Zamboanga del Zamboanga
2.3 2.3 2.5 2.2 2.0 2.6
Sur del Sur
North North
1.5 1.6 3.0 2.8 2.7 2.4
Cotabato Cotabato
Bukidnon 2.3 2.5 2.8 3.3 Bukidnon 3.1 2.3
Iloilo 2.0 2.4 2.4 2.5 Iloilo 2.4 2.3
Pangasinan 3.4 2.6 2.5 2.0 Pangasinan 2.7 2.2
Negros Negros
2.3 1.7 2.7 3.2 2.8 2.0
Oriental Oriental
Batangas 1.3 1.6 1.9 1.2 Batangas 2.5 1.8
NCR 2.2 1.7 1.9 2.3 NCR 2.2 1.8
Masbate 1.9 2.1 1.9 1.9 Masbate 1.7 1.7
Quezon 2.6 2.3 2.2 2.2 Quezon 2.2 1.7
South South
1.7 1.8 1.8 1.9 1.6 1.6
Cotabato Cotabato
Albay 1.9 1.9 2.2 1.6 Albay 1.4 1.6
Davao del Sur 2.3 2.4 2.4 2.1 Davao del Sur 1.5 1.6
Bohol 2.4 2.2 1.8 1.4 Bohol 1.5 1.6
Lanao del Lanao del
1.5 1.8 1.9 1.9 1.8 1.6
Norte Norte
Isabela 1.8 1.8 1.5 1.2 Isabela 1.3 1.6
Agusan del Sur 1.4 1.7 1.4 1.5 Agusan del Sur 1.3 1.5
Basilan 0.5 0.4 0.5 0.3 Basilan 0.4 1.5
Sultan Kudarat 1.6 1.5 1.5 1.8 Sultan Kudarat 1.7 1.5
Misamis Misamis
1.9 1.7 1.5 1.5 1.6 1.5
Oriental Oriental
Eastern Samar 1.0 1.0 1.2 1.0 Eastern Samar 1.0 1.4
Saranggani 1.1 1.2 1.1 1.1 Sarangani 0.9 1.4
Zamboanga Zamboanga
1.2 1.3 1.2 0.7 0.8 1.3
Sibugay Sibugay
Western Western
1.2 1.3 1.5 1.6 1.5 1.3
Samar Samar
26
Davao
0.8 1.3
Occidental
Northern Northern
1.3 1.3 1.3 1.5 1.5 1.3
Samar Samar
Sorsogon 1.3 1.2 1.3 1.7 Sorsogon 2.1 1.2
Cavite 0.2 0.4 0.5 1.1 Cavite 1.3 1.2
Cagayan 1.4 1.3 0.9 0.9 Cagayan 0.8 1.1
Nueva Ecija 2.1 2.4 2.1 2.5 Nueva Ecija 2.1 1.1
Compostela Compostela
1.1 1.0 1.1 0.8 0.7 1.1
Valley Valley
Camarines Camarines
1.0 1.0 0.7 1.1 1.1 1.1
Norte Norte
1.2 1.2 1.0 1.2 1.0 1.0
Norte Norte
Bulacan 0.9 0.8 1.0 0.7 Bulacan 0.6 1.0
1.3 1.3 1.0 1.0 0.8 1.0
Norte Norte
Misamis Misamis
1.0 1.1 1.0 0.9 1.0 0.9
Surigao Del Sur 1.1 1.2 0.8 1.1 Surigao Del Sur 1.0 0.9
Tarlac 1.0 0.9 0.9 1.2 Tarlac 1.0 0.8
Palawan 1.4 1.3 1.2 0.8 Palawan 0.8 0.8
Davao del Davao del
1.2 1.2 1.4 1.4 1.2 0.8
Norte Norte
Rizal 0.3 0.9 0.7 0.6 Rizal 0.7 0.8
Cotabato City 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.3 Cotabato City 0.4 0.7
Zambales 0.7 0.5 0.5 0.5 Zambales 0.4 0.7
Laguna 0.6 0.9 0.8 0.8 Laguna 0.7 0.7
Davao Oriental 1.1 1.1 1.0 0.7 Davao Oriental 0.7 0.7
Antique 1.1 0.9 0.7 0.6 Antique 0.5 0.7
0.8 0.7 0.8 1.0 0.9 0.6
Mindoro Mindoro
Southern Leyte 0.5 0.7 0.7 0.7 Southern Leyte 0.7 0.6
Oriental Oriental
1.5 1.2 1.0 0.8 0.7 0.5
Mindoro Mindoro
Tawi-tawi 1.0 0.6 0.5 0.3 Tawi-tawi 0.4 0.5
Romblon 0.6 0.5 0.4 0.6 Romblon 0.6 0.5
Pampanga 0.3 0.7 0.8 0.5 Pampanga 0.4 0.4
Nueva Vizcaya 0.3 0.2 0.4 0.2 Nueva Vizcaya 0.2 0.4
Aklan 0.9 0.9 0.6 0.3 Aklan 0.3 0.4
Bataan 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.1 Bataan 0.0 0.4
Isabela City 0.2 0.1 0.1 0.2 Isabela Citya 0.2 0.3
Catanduanes 0.4 0.3 0.4 0.6 Catanduanes 0.5 0.3
Ilocos Sur 0.5 0.5 0.4 0.4 Ilocos Sur 0.4 0.3
Benguet 0.2 0.2 0.1 0.1 Benguet 0.1 0.3
Capiz 0.9 0.9 0.9 0.5 Capiz 0.4 0.3
27
Abra 0.5 0.5 0.4 0.4 Abra 0.3 0.3
Dinagat Islands 0.2 0.2
Mt. Province 0.3 0.3 0.2 0.3 Mt. Province 0.3 0.2
La Union 0.8 0.9 0.6 0.5 La Union 0.7 0.2
Aurora 0.2 0.1 0.3 0.3 Aurora 0.3 0.2
Marinduque 0.4 0.3 0.3 0.2 Marinduque 0.2 0.2
Biliran 0.2 0.3 0.2 0.2 Biliran 0.2 0.2
Ifugao 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.3 Ifugao 0.4 0.2
Ilocos Norte 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 Ilocos Norte 0.2 0.2
Kalinga 0.4 0.2 0.2 0.4 Kalinga 0.4 0.2
Quirino 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 Quirino 0.2 0.1
Apayao 0.2 0.2 0.3 0.2 Apayao 0.2 0.1
Camiguin 0.1 0.1 0.2 0.2 Camiguin 0.2 0.1
Guimaras 0.2 0.2 0.2 0.0 Guimarasa 0.0 0.1
Siquijor 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.4 Siquijor 0.3 0.1
Batanes 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 Batanes 0.0 0.0
% Poor from % Poor from
37.8 36.4 35.0 34.0 35.5 31.8
Luzon Luzon
25.8 25.2 25.5 25.3 24.7 23.0
Visayas Visayas
36.4 37.9 39.3 40.4 39.5 45.1
Mindanao Mindanao
28
Table 4 Human Development Components of HDI for Provinces in the Philippines: 2015
Expected Per Capita

Life Expectancy Mean years
years of Income (PPP
Province at birth (years) of Schooling HDI 2015
Schooling NCR 2015
2015 2015
2015 Pesos) 2015
Benguet 70.1 11 13.4 93,698 0.85
Metro Manila 73.3 11.1 13.1 89,330 0.849
Laguna 71.5 10.2 12.2 85,064 0.799
Rizal 70.8 10.4 12.6 83,104 0.795
Bataan 69.9 10 12.3 85,908 0.793
Biliran 70.3 9.7 12.9 79,934 0.772
Pampanga 70.8 9.9 12.6 77,944 0.765
Aurora 70.9 8.6 14.4 77,664 0.763
Batanes 71.2 11.2 7 90,087 0.758
Bulacan 70.6 9.7 12.6 76,879 0.757
Cavite 70.7 10.4 12.3 73,413 0.748
Ilocos Norte 70 9.9 12.8 71,967 0.735
Batangas 70.2 9.7 12.6 71,794 0.731
Davao del Sur 69.8 9.5 12.6 71,934 0.728
La Union 68.5 9.9 13 70,178 0.722
Antique 70.6 8.6 13.3 68,520 0.708
Misamis Oriental 69.7 9.9 12.9 66,678 0.708
Palawan 70.1 8.6 12.7 68,111 0.699
Ilocos Sur 71.2 9.4 13.6 60,788 0.683
Guimaras 69.9 10.7 13.6 59,178 0.682
Philippines 71 9.3 12.6 61,317 0.676
Cagayan 70.6 8.9 12.9 61,145 0.671
Cebu 68.6 9.3 12.8 61,619 0.668
Iloilo 70.3 9.7 13.2 57,806 0.661
South Cotabato 70.1 9.5 13.1 58,529 0.661
Marinduque 66.8 9 13 62,078 0.66
Aklan 70.5 9.1 12.2 59,586 0.657
Nueva Vizcaya 71.2 9.1 12.5 58,125 0.655
Zambales 70.2 9.6 13.1 56,528 0.652
Isabela 69.1 9.1 12.4 58,622 0.648
Tarlac 70.9 9.5 12.2 56,331 0.644
Pangasinan 69.1 9.8 12.2 56,640 0.643
Zamboanga del Sur 70.3 8.9 12.8 56,443 0.642
Romblon 68.8 8.8 13.6 55,263 0.632
Oriental Mindoro 70.2 7.9 13 56,327 0.63
Camiguin 70.4 9.3 13.7 51,841 0.624
Bohol 68.7 8.7 12.8 54,897 0.622
Capiz 71.1 7.9 12 54,266 0.612
Kalinga 70.9 8.5 13.9 50,533 0.609
Occidental Mindoro 68.4 8.4 12.5 53,788 0.607
29
Expected Per Capita
Life Expectancy Mean years
years of Income (PPP
Province at birth (years) of Schooling HDI 2015
Schooling NCR 2015
2015 2015
2015 Pesos) 2015
Albay 69.3 9.1 13 51,198 0.606
Nueva Ecija 70.2 9.1 11.8 51,505 0.603
Lanao del Norte 70 8.8 12.9 50,109 0.599
Agusan del Norte 71.2 9.3 12.5 48,868 0.597
Quezon 70.7 8.6 11.6 50,637 0.592
Misamis Occidental 68.3 9.8 12.3 49,320 0.591
Negros Occidental 68.6 8.6 12.4 48,945 0.578
Surigao del Norte 67.2 9.1 13.2 47,976 0.577
Apayao 70.2 8.3 12.5 47,273 0.57
Abra 70.5 9.3 11.9 46,243 0.569
Quirino 70.4 7.5 12.4 48,098 0.566
Leyte 69.7 8.3 12.3 46,856 0.564
Davao Oriental 69.4 7.1 13 47,432 0.557
Davao del Norte 70.6 8.7 12.5 44,118 0.552
Zamboanga Sibugay 68.4 8.4 13.3 44,684 0.551
Catanduanes 68.5 9.2 12.3 44,170 0.548
Southern Leyte 69.5 8.3 12.9 44,182 0.547
Camarines Norte 70.3 9.3 12.5 42,848 0.546
Western Samar 70.4 7.2 13.4 44,664 0.545
Surigao del Sur 67.4 8.8 13 43,708 0.541
Camarines Sur 67.7 9.1 12.9 42,377 0.534
Ifugao 72.3 8 12.1 42,260 0.532
Eastern Samar 70.2 8 13.6 41,809 0.531
Compostela Valley 69.7 8.3 11.9 39,579 0.501
Sultan Kudarat 71 7.8 11.9 38,904 0.494
Mt. Province 72.5 8 12 38,033 0.493
Negros Oriental 69.8 7.5 12.1 39,334 0.492
Northern Samar 68.9 7.9 13.2 37,574 0.484
Sorsogon 67.4 8.1 13 37,771 0.481
North Cotabato 69.6 7.7 11.9 38,057 0.48
Agusan del Sur 67.2 7.9 12 38,329 0.478
Tawi-tawi 62.6 7.6 10.7 40,801 0.471
Source: Statistical Annex A1: Human Development Index 2015
30
5. Problems on the Methodology of Determining Poverty and
Poverty Thresholds
It must be pointed out that the new data showing a fall in income-based poverty incidence
in 2018 differs from the surveyed data of self-rated poverty of the Social Weather Stations
(SWS). Figure 10 shows the graph of the incidence of self-rated poverty of SWS. It indicates
that there was a sharp drop in self-rated poverty in 2015-2016 towards the end of the Aquino
Administration, as predicted by the Family Income and Expenditure Survey (FIES) of the PSA.
During the Duterte years of 2016-2019, the chart does show a slow downward trend in self-
rated poverty, but there was a rather sharp increase in 2018 due to high inflation.
Figure 10. Self-rated poverty: who is “mahirap” (poor), Philippines, April 1983-Jun 2019
Source: Social Weather Station (SWS), https://www.sws.org.ph/swsmain/artcldisppage/?artcsyscode=ART-20190720000106
31
6. Gender Disparities
The Philippines has a reputation for being advanced in gender equality, ranking eighth in the
Global Gender Gap Report 2018 (WEF 2018). This is mainly because of an adequate
percentage of women in politics and professional jobs, and parity in school attendance and
education levels between men and women. But the latest Gender Gap Report 2020 (WEF 2019)
released on December 17, 2019 shows that the Philippines’ rank fell sharply from eighth to
16th place. If one looks closely at the indicators, the driving force causing the decline is
maternal and women’s health and survival as well as women’s labor force participation.
These two crucial aspects will be discussed later.
Tables 5 and 6 provide the HDI gender inequality index (the lower the index, the better) of
selected Asian countries. This is a composite index of labor force participation rates,
maternal health, education level, and women empowerment in politics. Table 5 shows that
the Philippine gender inequality index is much worse than the more developed economies
such as Singapore, Korea, China, Malaysia, and is doing worse than Thailand and Vietnam,
even if Vietnam is economically worse off than the Philippines. It lags behind Sri Lanka and
is almost as gender unequal as the struggling developing countries such as Indonesia, Lao
PDR, and Cambodia. The table shows that India and Bangladesh have the poorest indices on
gender inequality.
Table 5 Gender Inequality Index (GII): Human Development Report
HDI Rank
Country 1995 2000 2005 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
(2017)
136 Bangladesh 0.71 0.68 0.63 0.58 0.57 0.56 0.56 0.55 0.54 0.54 0.54
146 Cambodia 0.66 0.59 0.56 0.49 0.48 0.48 0.48 0.47 0.47 0.47 0.47
86 China - 0.25 0.23 0.18 0.18 0.17 0.16 0.16 0.15 0.15 0.15
130 India 0.68 - 0.61 0.58 0.57 0.56 0.55 0.54 0.53 0.52 0.52
116 Indonesia 0.58 0.56 0.53 0.48 0.48 0.47 0.47 0.47 0.46 0.46 0.45
22 Korea 0.27 0.19 0.10 0.09 0.09 0.08 0.07 0.07 0.06 0.06 0.06
139 Lao PDR - 0.57 0.54 0.50 0.49 0.49 0.48 0.47 0.47 0.46 0.46
57 Malaysia 0.39 0.33 0.32 0.31 0.31 0.30 0.29 0.28 0.28 0.28 0.28
113 Philippines 0.48 0.47 0.46 0.45 0.44 0.44 0.43 0.43 0.43 0.42 0.42
9 Singapore 0.25 0.27 0.16 0.08 0.09 0.08 0.07 0.06 0.06 0.06 0.06
76 Sri Lanka 0.47 - 0.43 0.40 0.38 0.38 0.37 0.37 0.37 0.35 0.35
83 Thailand 0.4 0.39 0.34 0.32 0.31 0.31 0.31 0.38 0.37 0.37 0.39
116 Viet Nam 0.38 0.34 0.31 0.33 0.33 0.32 0.32 0.32 0.32 0.30 0.30
Last updated: January 31, 2019 Source: 2018 Human Development Statistical Update, UNDP
32
Table 6 Gender Inequality Indicators and Components
Population with
Gender Maternal Adolesce Share of Labour force
at least some
Inequality mortality nt birth seats in participation
secondary
Index ratio rate parliament rate
education
(births (% ages 25 and (% ages 15 and
HDI Country (deaths
per older) older)
rank per
1,000 (% held by
Value Rank 100,000
women women)
live
ages 15– Female Male Female Male
births)
19)
61 Malaysia 0.274 58 40 13.4 15.8 79.8 81.8 50.9 77.4
71 Sri Lanka 0.380 86 30 20.9 5.8 82.6 83.1 34.9 72.2
77 Thailand 0.377 84 20 44.9 5.3 43.1 48.2 59.5 76.2
85 China 0.163 39 27 7.6 24.9 75.4 83.0 61.3 75.9
106 Philippines 0.425 98 114 54.2 29.1 75.6 72.4 45.7 74.1
111 Indonesia 0.451 103 126 47.4 19.8 44.5 53.2 52.2 82.0
118 Viet Nam 0.314 68 54 30.9 26.7 66.2 77.7 72.7 82.5
129 India 0.501 122 174 13.2 11.7 39.0 63.5 23.6 78.6
135 Bangladesh 0.536 129 176 83.0 20.3 45.3 49.2 36.0 81.3
140 Lao PDR 0.463 110 197 65.4 27.5 35.0 46.0 76.8 79.7
146 Cambodia 0.474 114 161 50.2 19.3 15.1 28.1 75.2 87.6
Note: Estimates modelled by the International Labour Organization.
Source: 2019 Human Development Report, Statistical Annex, Table 5.
33
Table 7 Labor Force, Labor Force Participation Rate and Men-Women Participation Gap by Sex,
Philippines: 1998 – 2017 (In Thousands Except Rates)
Labor Force Labor Force Participation Rate Men-Women

Participation
Both Sexes Men Women Both Sexes Men Women Gap
2008 Average 36,805 22,673 14,132 63.6 78.8 48.6 30.1

January 36,368 22,395 13,973 63.4 78.5 48.4 30.1
April 36,450 22,594 13,856 63.2 78.7 47.8 30.9
July 37,343 22,831 14,511 64.3 79 49.7 29.3
October 37,058 22,872 14,187 63.7 78.9 48.6 30.3
2009 Average 37,892 23,173 14,719 64 78.6 49.4 29.2
January 37,116 22,818 14,298 63.3 78.3 48.5 29.8
April 37,824 23,181 14,643 64 79 49.3 29.7
July 38,430 23,260 15,170 64.6 78.5 50.8 27.7
October 38,197 23,433 14,764 64 78.8 49.3 29.5
2010 Average 38,893 23,729 15,164 64.1 78.5 49.7 28.8
January 38,828 23,515 15,314 64.5 78.4 50.7 27.7
April 38,512 23,521 14,991 63.6 78.1 49.2 28.9
July 38,946 23,838 15,108 63.9 78.6 49.4 29.2
October 39,287 24,044 15,243 64.2 78.9 49.6 29.3
2011 Average 40,006 24,345 15,660 64.6 79 50.4 28.6
January 39,210 24,021 15,190 63.7 78.5 49.1 29.4
April 39,691 24,220 15,471 64.2 78.8 49.8 28.9
July 39,928 24,241 15,687 64.3 78.4 50.4 28
October 41,194 24,899 16,295 66.3 80.4 52.2 28.2
2012 Average 40,426 24,616 15,810 64.2 78.5 50 28.5
January 40,226 24,538 15,689 64.2 78.7 49.8 28.9
April 40,645 24,783 15,861 64.7 79.3 50.2 29
July 40,401 24,462 15,940 64 77.7 50.4 27.3
October 40,433 24,682 15,752 63.9 78.2 49.6 28.6
2013 Average 41,022 24,968 16,055 63.9 78.1 49.9 28.2
January 40,834 24,667 16,167 64.1 77.7 50.6 27.1
April 40,906 24,996 15,910 63.8 78.4 49.4 29
July 41,178 25,107 16,071 63.9 78.2 49.7 28.5
October 41,172 25,100 16,071 63.9 78.1 49.8 28.3
2014 Average 41,379 25,093 16,286 64.6 78.6 50.7 28
January 39,387 23,943 15,444 63.8 77.8 49.8 28
April 41,588 25,137 16,451 65.2 79.2 51.3 27.9
July 41,231 25,002 16,229 64.4 78.3 50.5 27.8
October 41,319 25,141 16,178 64.3 78.4 50.3 28.2
2015 Average 41,342 25,062 16,280 63.7 77.3 50.1 27.2
January 41,164 25,073 16,091 63.7 77.8 49.7 28.1
April 41,840 25,260 16,580 64.6 78.2 51 27.2
July 41,901 25,362 16,539 62.9 76.2 49.6 26.6
34
Labor Force Labor Force Participation Rate Men-Women
Participation
Both Sexes Men Women Both Sexes Men Women Gap
October 42,146 25,609 16,536 63.3 76.9 49.6 27.3

2016 Average 43,361 26,521 16,840 63.5 77.6 49.3 28.3
January 42,520 25,719 16,801 63.3 76.6 50 26.6
April 43,289 26,616 16,674 63.5 78.2 48.9 29.3
July 43,286 26,515 16,771 63.2 77.5 49 28.5
October 43,724 26,843 16,882 63.6 77.9 49.3 28.6
2017 Average 42,775 26,667 16,107 61.2 76.2 46.2 30
January 42,109 26,437 15,672 60.7 76.1 45.2 30.9
April 42,714 26,645 16,069 61.4 76.6 46.2 30.4
July 42,544 26,613 15,932 60.6 75.7 45.5 30.3
October 43,732 26,975 16,757 62.1 76.4 47.8 28.6
Source of data: Philippine Statistics Authority, Labor Force Survey, Public Use Files. Table 2.8
Notes:
1. Details may not add up to totals due to rounding.
2. Labor force participation rate is the ratio of the total labor force to the total household population 15
years old and over multiplied by 100.
3. Annualized data for 2014 refer to the average of estimates for April, July and October survey rounds.
The estimates for these rounds exclude Leyte province.
4. Annualized data for 2015 refer to the average of the four survey rounds that exclude Leyte. The use of
the four survey rounds that exclude Leyte was based on the results of the referendum conducted among
members of the Interagency Committee on Labor and Productivity Statistics (IACLPS).
5. Starting April 2016 round, the Labor Force Survey (LFS) adopted the 2013 Master Sample Design as well
as the population projections based on the 2010 Census of Population and Housing (2010 CPH) while
previous survey rounds were derived using the 2000 CPH population projections.
6. Annualized data for 2016 was computed as the average of the four survey rounds using the January 2016
round that was based on the 2010 CPH population projections.
35
Table 8 Labor Force Participation Rate and Unemployment Rate by Gender and Age, April 2019
Labor Force
Sex and Age Group Unemployment Rate
Participation Rate
Both Sexes 61.39 5.13
Total
15 - 24 38.96 12.89
25 - 34 74.41 5.82
35 - 44 78.39 2.88
45 - 54 76.85 2.11
55 - 64 64.33 2.07
65 and over 32.93 1.24
Male 75.29 5.24
Total
15 - 24 47.13 11.69
25 - 34 92.48 5.71
35 - 44 95.2 3.04
45 - 54 92.36 2.55
55 - 64 77.63 2.49
65 and over 43.2 1.73
Female 47.4 4.97
Total
15 - 24 30.27 14.98
25 – 34 55.38 5.99
35 – 44 61.14 2.6
45 – 54 61.34 1.42
55 - 64 51.74 1.44
65 and over 25.18 0.6
36
6.1. Women have much lower labor force participation than men
One can see in Tables 7, 8, and 9 that women participate in paid work much less than men.
On average, at least 75% of men participate in the working labor force, while only an average
of 45% to 50% of women do. A major reason for this is because unpaid care and domestic
work at home is mostly borne by women, which oftentimes force them to stop in their paid
work or work less. It is also possible that at the bottom end, there are occupations (farming,
fishing) where women’s participation is not counted. Jobs where women dominate in terms
of employment numbers are in sales and in domestic help, which are mostly low-paid jobs.
Table 9 shows the gender and age structure of labor force participation rates in April 2019.
One can see that in all age groups, female labor force participation rates were much lower
than males. More than 90% of males aged 25 to 54 were in the labor force, and almost 80%
of those aged 55-64 were also included. Only males aged 15-24 (i.e. schooling age) and 65
and over (elderly and retired) had their labor force participation reduced with rates falling to
40% to 50%.
The same table shows that women’s labor force participation rate from age 15 to 24 was
around 30%, compared to almost 50% of men of the same age. This means that a significant
number of women did not participate in the labor force in this age bracket. For ages 25 to 34,
female labor force participation rates were at less than 60% as these are the marriage and
child-rearing periods of most women. At ages 35 to 54, women’s labor force participation
rates went up slightly to more than 60%. It was still a very low percentage compared to the
men of the same age group who had more than 90% labor force participation rate. Women’s
labor force participation rate fell to only 25% for those aged beyond 65.
Table 10 shows the labor force participation rates of women and men in the regions of the
Philippines for the years 2013 to 2017. What is very evident was the very low labor force
participation rates (LFPR) of women in BARMM. Its low LFPR for women was already at a low
56% in 2013 and fell even further to 46% in 2017. This could mean that the conflict situation
in BARMM, coupled with the depressed economy of the region, conspired to put women in the
region out of the workplace.
Table 10 presents the LFPR for men and women based on education level attainment. Unlike
men, the table shows women’s LFPR fell spectacularly when they did not finish high school
and college. This may be due to women who did not finish high school or dropped out of
college getting married early and/or bearing children. It may also be that there were fewer
jobs available for women who did not complete college and high school compared to their
male counterparts. Men can go into jobs like construction, drivers of public and private
vehicles, agricultural workers and farming, which are traditionally not open to women.
37
Table 9 Labor Force Participation Rate by Region and Sex, Philippines: 2013 - 2017 (in percent)
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

BOTH SEXES
Philippines 63.9 64.6 63.7 63.5 61.2
National Capital Region 63.5 64.4 62.9 62.9 61.1
Cordillera Administrative region 67 67.8 67.1 66.1 62.7
Region I - Ilocos Region 61.3 61.7 61.3 62 58.9
Region II - Cagayan Valley 67 67 67 65.7 63.4
Region III - Central Luzon 62 62.6 61.5 62.1 58.7
Region IV-A - CALABARZON 64.5 65.5 64.5 64.2 63.7
Region IV-B - MIMAROPA 66.3 67.5 65.6 65.3 64
Region V- Bicol Region 63.9 62.8 63.3 62.6 60.1
Region VI - Westerm Visayas 62.7 64.1 63.1 64.2 61.6
Region VII - Central Visayas 64.7 66.4 67.4 66.9 65
Region VIII- Eastern Visayas 64.6 64.9 62.8 62.3 60.3
Region IX - Zamboanga Peninsula 65.1 64.3 62.5 63.9 58.5
Region X - Northern Mindanao 68.3 69.9 67.8 66.7 63.8
Region XI - Davao Region 64.2 65.6 64.2 62.9 62.7
Region XII - SOCCSKSARGEN 65.3 65 64.3 62.2
Region XIII – Caraga 66.5 66.3 64.7 63.6 62.1
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao 56 56.8 54.4 52.4 46.1
MEN
Philippines 78.1 78.6 77.3 77.6 76.2
Cordillera Administrative region 78.5 78.4 77.5 76.8 74.3
Region I - Ilocos Region 77.5 77.2 76.1 77.7 76
Region II - Cagayan Valley 81.8 81.8 81.4 81.4 79.1
Region III - Central Luzon 77.9 78.6 77.2 77.7 75.7
Region IV-A – CALABARZON 77.2 78.2 76.5 76.8 76.7
Region IV-B – MIMAROPA 81 81.4 78 79.2 78.4
Region V- Bicol Region 78.7 78.2 77.4 77.4 75
Region VI - Westerm Visayas 76.3 77.2 76 76.9 75.6
Region VII - Central Visayas 75 76.6 77.8 78.2 76.8
Region VIII- Eastern Visayas 80.2 80 77.5 77.4 75.1
Region X - Northern Mindanao 81.5 81.7 79.8 80 78.4
Region XII – SOCCSKSARGEN 80.7 80.6 79.7 79.8 78.5
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao 79.5 80 77.5 75.9 70.1
WOMEN
Philippines 49.9 50.7 50.1 49.3 46.2
National Capital Region 53 53.6 52.5 52.5 48.9
Cordillera Administrative region 55.3 56.5 56 54.8 50.5
38
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Region I - Ilocos Region 44.8 46 46.2 46 41.5
Region II - Cagayan Valley 51 51 51.2 48.8 46.3
Region IV-A – CALABARZON 52.5 53.5 53 52.2 51.3
Region IV-B – MIMAROPA 50.9 53 52.5 50.8 48.8
Region VI - Westerm Visayas 49.1 50.9 50 51.3 47.3
Region VII - Central Visayas 54.7 56.4 57.2 55.6 53.4
Region X - Northern Mindanao 55.1 58 55.6 52.9 48.7
Region XI - Davao Region 47.4 49.6 48 45.3 45.3
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao 33 34 31.6 29.3 22.4
39
Table 10 Labor Force Participation Rate by Highest Grade Completed and Sex, Philippines: 2013 - 2017
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

BOTH SEXES 63.9 64.6 63.7 63.5 61.2
No Grade Completed 54 53.5 52.9 52.4 49.8
Elementary 69.8 70.9 69.8 68.7 66
Undergraduate 71 72.2 70.9 70 67.6
Graduate 68.7 69.8 68.7 67.3 64.3
SPED NA NA NA 20 -
Undergraduate NA NA NA 12.5 -
Graduate NA NA NA 50 -
High School 59.9 61.2 60 60 -
Undergraduate 50.9 52.6 50.3 47.9 -
Graduate 65.1 65.9 65.5 67.6 -
Junior High School NA NA NA NA 58.4
Undergraduate NA NA NA NA 50.2
Graduate NA NA NA NA 63.1
Senior High School NA NA NA NA 10.7
Post-Secondary 74.4 74.7 74.3 74.5 74.3
Undergraduate 70.5 70 68.8 70 71.7
Graduate 75.7 75.7 75.3 75.3 74.6
College 63.9 63.5 63.2 63.3 63
Undergraduate 49.2 48 47.3 48.1 49.6
Graduate 78 77.7 78 78.5 76.9
MEN 78.1 78.6 77.3 77.6 76.2
No Grade Completed 69.8 69 68 68.7 65.7
Elementary 85.6 86.4 85.2 85.2 83.7
Undergraduate 85.7 86.7 85.4 85.5 84.3
Graduate 85.4 86 85.1 84.8 83
SPED NA NA NA 22.1 -
Undergraduate NA NA NA 11.6 -
Graduate NA NA NA 66.6 -
High School 75.6 76.9 75.2 75.5 -
Undergraduate 64.8 66.5 63.8 61.2 -
Graduate 82.4 83 81.9 84.9 -
Post-Secondary 87.7 88.3 87.7 87.8 87.8
Undergraduate 82.9 82.1 81.4 82.9 87.4
40
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Graduate 89.3 89.6 89 88.7 87.9
College 72.4 71.9 71 71.5 72
Undergraduate 61.2 59.9 58.7 59.7 61.8
Graduate 84.9 84.6 84.5 85.4 84.4
WOMEN 49.9 50.7 50.1 49.3 46.2
No Grade Completed 38.9 38.4 37.5 36.1 33.9
Elementary 50.4 51.7 50.2 48.3 43.8
Undergraduate 49.6 50.8 49.5 47.4 43.2
Graduate 51 52.4 50.8 49.1 44.4
SPED NA NA NA 12.4 -
Undergraduate NA NA NA 52 -
Graduate NA NA NA 54 -
High School 44.1 45.3 44.5 44.1 -
Undergraduate 35.7 37.2 35.3 33.1 -
Graduate 48.8 49.5 49.4 50.6 -
Undergraduate NA NA NA NA 33
Post-Secondary 61.5 61.7 62.1 63 62.5
Undergraduate 56.4 56.4 54.7 55.7 55.2
Graduate 63 62.7 63.3 64 63.4
College 57.2 56.9 57 56.7 55.8
Undergraduate 38.3 37.4 37.2 37.4 38.4
Graduate 73.2 72.9 73.6 73.6 71.8
Source: Source of data: Philippine Statistics Authority, Labor Force Survey, Public Use Files., Table 2.14
Notes:
1. Labor force participation rate is the ratio of the total labor force to the total household population 15
years old and over multiplied by 100.
2. ** Less than 0.05 percent.
3. Starting 2017, data for SPED is included under Elementary.
4. Starting 2017, High School data is broken down into Junior and Senior High School.
41
6.2. Employment rates, occupations and wages: gender exclusivity in some occupations
Table 11 shows the employment rates (or the opposite of unemployment rates) for men and
women in the Philippines and the regions of the country from 2013 to 2017. It can be noted
that there was no significant difference in the employment rates of men and women in the
country and the regions. Thus, the difference really lies in the labor force participation rates
between women and men.
Table 12 presents the average daily wage and salary for men and women in the Philippines
and the regions of the country from 2013 to 2017. Data that appears to show that that there
is no gender pay gap does not account for the reality that the percentage of women working
in all regions is significantly less than men.
To summarize, the main disadvantage of women in the labor arena is in the labor force
participation rate – which accentuates the inequality in paid and unpaid wages to be
discussed in Box 1. The other possibility of gender disparity is in the area of occupations
with more upward mobility and skills upgrading, where men are more dominant. These
include, as Figure 11 shows, administrative and support services, and jobs in information
and communications.
Figure 11. Distribution of Working Women and Men

by Industry Group, 2015
Transportation Storage
Mining and Quarrying
Water Supply; Sewerage, Waste Management
Administrative and Support Service Activities
Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation
Activities of Extra-Territorial Organizations
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Activities
Financial and Insurance Activities
Wholesale and Retail Trade; Repair of Motor
Other Service Activities
Activities of Households as Employers

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Women Men
42
Box 4 discusses the issue of paid and unpaid (market and non-market) work for women and
men, and the length of hours spent in each activity, as well as the total hours spent working.
Women are obviously at a disadvantage.
Box 4: Women’s Unpaid and Underpaid Work: Care and Housework, and Unpaid Family Work
In the section on labor force participation, it was shown that men participate much more in
market work than women because of the much bigger burden placed on women for child care,
housework and even elderly care. Market work gets paid while child care and housework do
not. Thus, men earn much more income than women.
Such situation points to the gender inequality in paid and unpaid work, as well as inequality
in the total time worked by men and women. Many women working in the market also still bear
the bigger burden of unpaid child care and housework compared to men.
Figure 12. Time Spent on Paid Market Work by Age and Sex, Philippines: 1990 – 2015
43
Figure 13. Time spent on unpaid home production by age and sex: Philippines, 2000
Source: Figures 3 and 4, Abrigo and Franciso-Abrigo (2019), p. 6.
A study done by Abrigo and Abrigo (2019) analyzed women’s unpaid and underpaid work.
Figure 12 shows their estimates of men and women’s time spent in market work activities by
age. Note that men spend more than 30 hours a week on market work between 25 and 55
years of age. Women on average spend 20 hours a week of market work at age 25, then the
market work hours stagnate until age 35. This is because the ages from 25 to 35 are usually
the childbearing and child-rearing period of women. Hours spent by the woman in market
wage activity goes up significantly between ages 35 and 55. The hours in market work goes
down after age 55.
Figure 13 shows the average hours worked by men and women on non-market unpaid
activities of child care and housework. (Estimated hours on elderly care is very low for both
sexes). It is clear that women spend much more time on child care and housework – more
than 20 hours on housework at their peak, and five to 10 hours on child care at the peak.
It is interesting to note that there are two peaks for both women and men on child care. The
first is the younger age when they become mothers and fathers, though women spend much
more time on this and for a longer period of time (up to past 45 years old). Then child care for
both genders go up again when they become grandparents, while the mother-daughter might
enter the labor force. Again, it affects the elderly women much more, between ages 55 and
70 (with peak hours at around 60).
44
Table 13 gives the hours for market and non-market work for both genders at different ages.
One can see that throughout their lifetime – for all ages – women work more hours of
combined non-market and market work, compared to men. Women join market work at age
40 to 59, averaging 32.8 hours a week on market work activities. The disparity is greatest at
age 60 and above when grandmothers still have a lot of child care to do while the older retired
man has less hours of market or house-care work.
There is also the issue of unpaid family workers in a family business, such as a farm, sari-sari
store, vending and other family businesses. Table 14 shows that the share of unpaid family
workers in the total employed is shrinking in terms of percent of total employed. (Unpaid
family workers are becoming a smaller and smaller share of the working force.) It was 10% in
2013 and was only 6% in 2017. Table 15, however, shows that the majority of unpaid family
workers are women, accounting for 56% to 59% of the total.
The additional hours of care work brought on by this pandemic are taking a toll. Close to half
of the women who participated in a recent Oxfam survey reported more anxiety, depression,
lack of rest and sleep, and physical illness because of increased unpaid care work caused by
the pandemic. Even before COVID-19, women’s health was already impacted by their care
work—two-thirds of women in the Philippines had experienced an injury, illness, disability, or
other harm from their care work3.
3
Oxfam data from the Philippines show that women are generally spending up to five more hours a day on care
work since the Covid-19 pandemic. This includes more time preparing meals, washing and cleaning up, caring
for young children and relatives. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, majority of the female (20%) and male (12%)
youth respondents were only spending one to two hours in domestic work. This drastically changed for female
youth respondents as their time spent on domestic work soared from 20% (pre-Covid) to 25% (during Covid) or
more than five hours as the pandemic hit. Increased time spent can also be noticed for men as majority (10%)
spend two to three hours during Covid, compared to one to two hours pre-Covid.
45
Table 11 Employment Rate by Region and Sex, Philippines: 2013 - 2017 (In Percent)
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

BOTH SEXES
Philippines 92.9 93.4 93.7 94.6 94.3
Region I - Ilocos Region 91.7 91.8 91.6 93.8 91.1
Region IV-A - CALABARZON 90.8 92 92 92.8 93
Region IV-B - MIMAROPA 96 95.6 96.7 95.9 95.2
Region VI - Western Visayas 93.1 94.2 94.6 95.2 94.6
Region IX - Zamboanga Peninsula 96.5 96.5 96.5 96.2 96
Region XII - SOCCSKSARGEN 95.6 96.5 96.5 95.9 96
Caraga 94 94.8 94.3 95 94.9
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao 95.3 96.6 96.5 96.1 96.5
MEN
Philippines 92.7 93.1 93.4 94.4 94
Cordillera Administrative region 95.5 94.7 95.6 96 95.7
Region IV-A - CALABARZON 89.8 90.9 90.7 91.8 92.3
Region IV-B - MIMAROPA 96.2 95.7 96.6 96.4 95.3
Region V- Bicol Region 93.7 94.1 94.5 95.4 95
Region VI - Western Visayas 92.6 93.9 94.2 95 93.9
Region XII - SOCCSKSARGEN 95.7 96.7 96.5 96.1 96.5
Caraga 94.3 94.9 94.5 95.1 94.7
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao 96.9 97.6 97.6 97 97.1
WOMEN
Philippines 93.2 93.9 94.2 94.8 94.8
National Capital Region 91.2 91.5 93 94.2 94
46
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Region II - Cagayan Valley 95.8 95.5 96.5 96.1 96
Region IV-A - CALABARZON 92.3 93.4 93.6 94.2 94
Region IV-B - MIMAROPA 95.5 95.6 96.9 95.2 95.1
Region V- Bicol Region 93.1 94.2 94 95.3 96.2
Region VI - Western Visayas 93.9 94.7 95.1 95.6 95.8
Region VII - Central Visayas 95 95.2 95.2 96 96.3
Region IX - Zamboanga Peninsula 96 96.4 96.3 95.7 95.5
Region X - Northern Mindanao 94.3 94.8 94.2 94 94.4
Region XII - SOCCSKSARGEN 95.4 96.3 96.4 95.5 95.2
Caraga 93.5 94.6 94 94.8 95.4
Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao 91.9 94.3 94 93.8 94.8
Source of basic data: Philippine Statistics Authority, Labor Force Survey, Public Use Files.
Notes:
1. Employment rate is the ratio of the total employed to the total labor force multiplied by 100. Labor force
is the sum of all the employed and unemployed persons.** Less than 0.05 percent.
2. Rates were computed based on the averages of four survey rounds (January, April, July and October).
47
Table 12 Average Daily Basic Pay of Wage and Salary Workers by Region and Sex,
Philippines: 2013 – 2017 (In Pesos)
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

BOTH SEXES
Philippines 349.16 367.35 378.65 400.95 415.17
Cordillera Administrative region 388.63 406.73 414.68 432 432.46
Region IV-B – MIMAROPA 288.1 305.8 330.6 326.27 349.76
Caraga 309.08 332.99 340.14 352.25 355.53
MEN
Philippines 341.66 359.52 370.79 392.82 407.09
Region IV-B – MIMAROPA 289.16 317.83 309.51 342.93
Caraga 298.33 322.53 325.56 337.24 340.68
WOMEN
Philippines 360.7 379.34 390.68 414.29 428.83
48
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017
Region IV-B – MIMAROPA 314.38 334.83 352.03 357.97 362.67
Caraga 327.7 352.21 366.88 382.13 387.39
Notes:
1. Basic pay refers to pay for normal time prior to deductions of social security contributions, withholding
taxes, etc. It excludes allowances, bonuses, commissions, overtime pay, benefits in kind, etc.
2. Data also excludes those paid on commission basis, honorarium and boundary as in the case of
jeepney/bus/tricycle drivers.
Table 13 Average time spent per week on market and home production by sex and broad age group:
Philippines, 2000
Males Females
15-19 20-39 40-59 60+ 15-19 20-39 40-59 60+
Market Production (NTA) 9.6 39.2 44.1 17 10 22.2 32.8 18.4
Home Production (NTTA) 2 8.6 7.3 7.3 4.9 28 25.6 21.6
Child Care 0.2 2 0.8 1.5 0.7 7.6 4.5 4.2
Elder Care - - 0.1 - - 0.1 0.1 0.1
House work 1.7 6.5 6.4 5.8 4.2 20.3 21.1 17.2
Combined 11.6 47.8 51.4 24.3 14.9 50.2 58.4 40

Source: Abrigo and Francisco-Abrigo (2019)
Table 14 Unpaid Family Workers in Farm or Family Enterprise and Gender Composition
2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Unpaid Family Workers as % of Total Employed 10.3 10.8 10.0 8.0 6.0
% Males 43.3 43.0 43.7 41.5 41.2
% Females 56.7 57.0 56.3 58.5 58.8

Source: 2018 Gender Statistics on Labor and Employment, PSA, Table 2
49
Box 5: Scary sharp unemployment increase due to COVID-19
As stated earlier, the first quarter of this year showed a -0.5% fall in GDP, as the specter of COVID-
19 and lockdowns started sweeping the country in March. It was expected to go down even further
in the second quarter when practically the whole country was in lockdown. The rest of the year will
most likely see downturns in the economy as well, since many firms will still be closed or unable to
operate fully as a vaccine still has to be developed.
The April 2020 Labor Force Survey showed a really scary sharp and blanket increase in
unemployment throughout all regions of the country. From 5.1% unemployment rate in April 2019,
the PSA Labor Force Survey of April 2020 came up with 17.7% unemployment rate for April 2020,
affecting around 7.25 million workers. This is grossly understated. There are around three million
discouraged workers, who left the labor force (not looking for work) because of the lockdowns –
they know that they were shut out from employment and so were not looking for work). Add the
two figures and there are around 10 million unemployed workers. They bring unemployment rate to
around 22.5% (affecting 10 million workers) instead of 17.7% as officially reported by PSA for April
2020
Just as disturbing is that almost 13 million worker respondents claimed they had a job but did not
work at all during the lockdown period in April. It is uncertain how many of these workers got any
income during this period (some companies voluntarily gave salaries to their workers despite the
shutdown). These workers who had an employer but did not work during the lockdown made up
between 28% to 29% of the labor force (12,970,000). So, if we add the real unemployment rate of
more than 22% in the previous paragraph plus the (at least) 28% who did not work in April, one gets
a whopping 50% of the labor force not working in April 2020.
There is more. Out of those employed who actually worked, the full-time workers (working 40 hours
a week or more) fell from 28.4 million workers to just 9.9 million. Thus, more than 18 million workers
went from full-time workers to part-time workers. This makes up around 39% to 40% of the labor
force. Thus, around 22% to 23% of the labor force was unemployed (around 10 million workers),
another 28% to 29% (13 million workers) had a job but did not work in April, and another 39% to 40%
of them (18 million workers) went from full-time to part-time workers. All these mean that around
89% to 90% of the labor force were affected by the lockdown. Many who did not work or went from
full-time to part-time must have experienced a reduction in their salary. This is an astounding fall
in income for the workers.
According to the National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) and the Department of
Finance (DOF), the industries that lost revenues most are, in descending order: arts, entertainment
and culture (down 82.3%); travel / hotel and restaurants (down 81.9%), technical repair services,
educational services, construction, motor vehicles services; finance; sports and fitness services;
real estate; and professional/ scientific and technical services. These are practically the same
industries found in the Labor Force Survey to have shed the most employment and whose workers
had no work or went from full time to part time. The only addition from the Labor Force Survey is
the manufacturing sector, which was one of the top sectors whose workers either did not work at
50
all or went part-time. There was also electricity/ gas/ water industry which reduced its
employment significantly. Overall, the most significant sectors that lost employment and reduced
work were consistent: the arts/ entertainment/ cultural sector (#1) and the travel/ hotel and
restaurant sector (#2). Unfortunately, from June onwards, all social amelioration programs (SAP)
were stopped even as many remained unemployed under GCQ.
6.3. Maternal health and teenage pregnancies
Examining the maternal health before, during and after pregnancies, as well as the social
difficulties and obstructed opportunities for teenage and adolescent mothers, Table 16
shows that the Philippines has among the poorest adolescent birth rate statistics in Asia,
with only Bangladesh and Lao PDR having worse. The Philippines’ teenage pregnancy
situation is worse than many poorer countries such as Vietnam, India and Cambodia.
For maternal health, Table 15 shows the Philippines somewhere in the middle among the
countries listed, but doing much worse than Vietnam, which has a poorer economy. Table 16
shows clearly that, over time, the Philippines was the worst performer in reducing maternal
mortality among the countries included in the table. Cambodia was able to reduce maternal
deaths from 1,020 per 10,000 pregnant women in 1990 to 161 in 2015. Bangladesh and India
were able to reduce it from 569 and 556, respectively, in 1990 to 176 and 174, respectively,
in 2015. Vietnam was able to reduce it from 135 in 1990 to 54 in 2015. All the other countries
did relatively well in reducing maternal mortality between 1990 and 2015. But the Philippines
was able to reduce it from 156 in 1990 to only 114 in 2015, an almost marginal reduction rate.
51
Table 15 Components of Gender Inequality Index in Human Development Report 2018
Population with
Gender Maternal Share of Labour force
Adolescent at least some
Inequality mortality seats in participation
birth rate secondary
Index ratio parliament rate
education
(deaths (births per (% ages 25 and (% ages 15 and
HDI Country per 1,000 older) older)
(% held by
rank Value Rank 100,000 women
women)
live ages 15–
Female Male Female Male
births) 19)
2010 – 2010 –
2017 2017 2015 2015-2020 2017 2017 2017
2017 2017
57 Malaysia 0.287 62 40 13.4 13.1 78.9 81.3 50.8 77.4

76 Sri Lanka 0.354 80 30 14.1 5.8 82.6 83.1 35.1 74.1
83 Thailand 0.393 93 20 51.9 4.8 42.4 47.5 60.5 77.3
86 China 0.152 36 27 6.4 24.2 74.0 82.0 61.5 76.1
113 Philippines 0.427 97 114 60.5 29.1 76.6 72.4 49.6 75.1
116 Indonesia 0.453 104 126 47.4 19.8 44.5 53.2 50.7 81.8
116 Viet Nam 0.304 67 54 27.3 26.7 66.2 77.7 73.2 83.5
130 India 0.524 127 174 23.1 11.6 39.0 63.5 27.2 78.8
136 Bangladesh 0.542 134 176 83.5 20.3 44.0 48.2 33.0 79.8
139 Lao PDR 0.461 109 197 62.6 27.5 33.6 45.2 76.9 79.7
146 Cambodia 0.473 116 161 50.2 18.5 15.1 28.1 80.9 88.7
Source: 2018 Human Development Statistical Update, UNDP
Table 16 Maternal mortality ratio (deaths per 100,000 live births)
HDI Rank
Country 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
(2017)
136 Bangladesh 569 479 399 319 242 228 214 201 188 176
146 Cambodia 1020 730 484 315 202 188 178 173 167 161
86 China 97 72 58 48 35 33 31 29 28 27
130 India 556 471 374 280 215 206 197 189 181 174
116 Indonesia 446 326 265 212 165 156 148 140 133 126
139 Lao PDR 905 695 546 418 294 271 250 230 213 197
57 Malaysia 79 68 58 52 48 47 45 43 41 40
113 Philippines 152 122 124 127 129 127 126 121 117 114
76 Sri Lanka 75 70 57 43 35 33 32 32 31 30
83 Thailand 40 23 25 26 23 22 22 21 21 20
116 Viet Nam 139 107 81 61 58 56 56 55 54 54
Last updated: January 30, 2019
52
7. Vulnerability
Measuring poverty using just the income generated by the family glosses over many aspects
of poverty. A family whose income is higher than the poverty threshold may be poorer than a
family below the poverty threshold if the former has a family member suffering from a
debilitating illness.
The literature of poverty has talked about chronic and transient poverty where households
enter and exit poverty at varying periods and duration. Those households whose incomes
perennially fall (over time) below the poverty threshold are in chronic poverty, while those
who are in poverty only in some periods are in transient poverty.
This leads to the discussion of vulnerability and the multidimensional aspects of poverty. To
suggest that only members of households whose income falls below the poverty threshold
can be considered as poor is to oversimplify poverty. Indeed, there are various factors that
make the poor rise slightly above or fall below the poverty line. Table 18 provides examples
of the high risks faced by lower-income people on their assets and properties, on their
income generation, on their capabilities and access to nutrition, health, education, housing
and other services. Thus, deprivation in many aspects of life are constant vulnerabilities and
external threats which they cannot control but may drive them deeper into poverty.
There are three implications that can be derived from Table 17:
1) The poverty threshold should not be solid thresholds – one for each province. There must
be a buffer above these thresholds set by the government to target the vulnerable people.
2) There is a trend to look into multidimensional poverty, especially with the adoption of the
Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and the Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) before
that. The global development goals are a more ambitious attempt than the HDI to use
indicators that go beyond income-based determination of poverty and quality of life. (This
will be tackled in the next section).
3) There must be genuine efforts by the government to provide safety nets, social insurance
and quality social services to address the poverty and immense risks, threats and
vulnerabilities of lower-income groups.
In the Philippines, there is the conditional cash transfer program, the PhilHealth program,
social services for children and women, housing, etc., but all can still be improved in order to
have wider coverage and better-quality services. The PhilHealth insurance for the indigents
(and senior citizens) is not well known and understood among the poor.
53
Table 17 A Framework on Vulnerability of Low-Income Groups
Incomes, Transfers, Savings and

Assets Well-being /Capabilities
Credit
• human capital, labor, skills • wages and salaries, farm/ Ability to obtain:
• physical assets, financial assets livestock/ fisheries • nutrition
• commons and public goods • remittances, esp. OFW • health
• social capital remittances • education
• transfers such as conditional • housing
cash transfers
• accumulated savings
• access to credit at affordable
rates
Risks
• deaths/ illnesses of earning • unemployment, end of contract • lack of knowledge
household members or household • climate change, natural concerning nutrition and
head disasters, poaching and health
• skills become obsolete -- e.g. depletion of fishes, destruction • lack of access to quality
typing secretaries, bookkeeper of crops health services and
(because of new softwares) • illnesses/deaths of HH centers
• insecure land tenure, land- members, medical care and • lack of access to quality
grabbing funeral expenses education and schools
• financial crises: loss of financial • end of contract or layoffs of • lack of low-income
assets, property prices drop OFWs housing and other
• natural and climate change • high interest rates, financial facilities (e.g. day care
disasters, pollution, unsanitary crises, stoppage of credit lines centers)
conditions -- destruction of • inflation, recession, war, • lack of knowledge on
property and environment conflicts at local or national availability of social
• war, clashing dynasties, loss of levels insurance and safety nets
social entitlements due to
corruption, etc.
Source: Author's significant revision of table of Albert and Vizmanos (2018), Box 1
54
On the issue of vulnerability, Albert and Raymundo (2016) used twice the poverty threshold
used by the government to define ‘low-income’ – people who are vulnerable, and found that,
in so doing, in 2015, around 35% would be classified as vulnerable ‘low-income,’ as opposed
to 21.6% estimated poor households using the old poverty income threshold of 2015. The
identified ‘low-income’ group shows a detailed profile very similar to those identified as
‘poor.’ This indicates that a doubling of the poverty threshold, as a simple approach to
‘identifying’ low-income people, works well to include much of the vulnerable people who
may fall into poverty if some unforeseen circumstance occurs.
Figure 18. Incidence of Household Vulnerability by Poverty Status
Poor 40.5 44.9 14.6

2015
Nonpoor 8.7 32.5 58.8
Poor 51.0 37.9 11.1 Highly Vulnerable

2009
Relatively Vulnerable
Nonpoor 11.8 32.2 56.0
Not Vulnerable
Poor 54.5 39.1 6.4

2003
Nonpoor 9.4 36.1 54.6
0.0 20.0 40.0 60.0 80.0 100.0

Source: Albert and Vizmanos (2018)
Furthermore, Albert and Vizmanos (2018) in Figure 18 show that in 2015, 40.5% of the
identified poor (falling below the poverty threshold) were highly vulnerable (i.e., they had
more than 50% chance of staying poor in the next period), 44.9% were relatively vulnerable
(i.e., they had a 21.6% to 50% chance of being poor the next period – 21.6% being the poverty
incidence rate in 2015). Thus, 85.4% of the current poor are vulnerable – or have a significant
probability of staying poor in the next period. What is disturbing also is that among the non-
poor low-income group in 2015, 8.7% were highly vulnerable (more than 50% probability) of
becoming poor in the next period. About 32.5% of the non-poor (low-income population)
were relatively vulnerable (21.6% to 50% chance of becoming poor) in the next period. It
should be noted that 40.3% of low-income people were vulnerable to being poor in the next
period in 2015. These findings indicate that more needs to be done even if the data show
poverty incidence has gone down.
55
8. Multidimensional Poverty Index
The multidimensional poverty index was formulated in 2016, in addition to the human
development indices and as preparation for attaining the Sustainable Development Goals
(SDGs). Figure 19a presents an initial attempt to put additional dimensions to poverty by the
PSA. It shows that the most deprived dimension is educational attainment, wherein almost
five out of 10 families in 2017 had at least one family member unable to attain basic
education. Other serious deprivations are lack of ownership of assets such as a house (34%
in 2017), health insurance (32% in 2017), toilet facilities (22.6%), housing materials (21.7%)
and lack of source of water supply (14.6%).
Figure 19a: Incidence of Deprivation Among Families: 2016 and 2017
Electricity 8.2
4.9
Housing Materials 23.9
21.7
Tenure Status of Dwelling 2.4
4
Source of Water Supply 20.8
14.6
Toilet Facility 26.9
22.6
Ownership of Assets 43.3
34.3
Health Insurance 32.1
36.6 2016
Food Consumption 27.3 2017
21.8
Hunger 0.3
0.6
Working Children Not in School 2.6
1.3
Underemployment 8.2
6.6
Educational Attainment 59.3
49.4
School Attendance 6.3
3.8
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Source: PSA, https://psa.gov.ph/content/filipino-families-are-most-deprived-education-0
56
Figure 19b: Incidence of Deprivation:
Educational Attainment, School Attendance
59.3
Educational Attainment
49.4
2016
2017
6.3
School Attendance
3.8
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Figure 19c: Incidence of Deprivation of Health Insurance, Food

Consumption and Incidence of Hunger
36.6
Health Insurance
32.1
27.3 2016
Food Consumption
21.8
2017
0.3
Hunger
0.6
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40
Sources of Figs. 19a, 19b, and 19c: PSA website, Multidimensional Poverty Index, www.psa.gov.ph
Figure 19b shows that, in 2017, almost 50% of the population were deprived of attaining a
degree such as a grade school diploma, a high school diploma or a college diploma. There
were around 4% of grade school and high school youths not attending classes. Figure 19c
shows 32% of households did not have health insurance, and almost 22% of people said
there were periods during the past year when they were deprived of food that would satisfy
their hunger.
It can be seen from these figures that the sufferings of the poor in many dimensions are
serious and call for immediate active government interventions. The country cannot afford
to wait for their incomes to rise.
57
9. Ethnic Disparities
Reyes et al. (2017) did a study on ethnic disparities, and found that indigenous peoples and
Muslims lag in access to education, basic services – especially water and sanitation, and
access to electricity – compared to non-indigenous peoples. However, the authors found
this disparity in access falling over time. More importantly, they found that the inequalities
among indigenous peoples were highest within the group i.e., high disparities occur among
Muslim communities, more than between Muslim and non-Muslim groups. This shows class
stratification in society accounts for the disparities among indigenous peoples. It also
indicates that discrimination against indigenous people – shown by higher access to
education, water and electricity for non-indigenous peoples – may exist but it is waning.
The study did not make any explicit claims whether the lesser access by indigenous peoples
to basic services and lesser access by poorer indigenous peoples versus more well-off
indigenous peoples really have to do with income disparities or the lack of available
resources for the basic services in the area. Most likely, both factors are present. Finally,
the paper shows that armed conflict plays a big role in the lower access to basic services
and lower incomes in the conflict-affected communities in Southern Philippines.
10. Conclusion: Drivers of Low Economic Development, Low

Incomes and Serious Income Inequality
The slow growth of human development and the existence of poverty and inequality can be
attributed to the following:
11.1. A lack of industry policy and allowing markets and the private sector to
determine the economic path
A major factor for the slow economic development and HDI improvement of the Philippines is
the fact that economic planners and the elite of the country had decided since the1980s to
use markets and the private sector as the main engines for achieving growth and economic
development. All modern theories in economics counter this approach and point to the need
for industrial policy and planned equitable growth by the national and local governments to
address market failures. The economic elite assumes the government and the state are
incapable of industrial policy, and are prone to corruption, cronyism and rent-seeking
behavior. This position – referred to by progressives as neoliberalism and the Washington
Consensus – is passé.
The focus on accountability also leads to an analysis of the responsibilities of actors and
institutions when rights go unfulfilled. This analysis and understanding are essential to
achieving progress in human development for everyone. Better economic, social and
58
political governance goes hand in hand with genuine economic development and equitable
growth.
Table 18 shows the share of the economic sectors in the GRDP of the various regions. The
regions are listed in descending order of per capita GRDP. Under industry are mining,
manufacturing, construction and electricity, gas and water supply (EGW). Under services are
1) transportation, storage and communications; 2) trade, hotel and restaurants, repair of
motor vehicles (a hodgepodge of services but the biggest sector is trade); 3) financial
intermediation; 4) real estate and other business services; 5) public administration and
defense; 6) other services.
NCR’s economy is mainly a service, not an industrial and manufacturing one. Manufacturing
has been delegated to nearby industrial zones in CALABARZON and Central Luzon (Clark and
Subic). One thing that can be discerned in Table 19 is that the more industrial and
manufacturing areas, including NCR, have higher per capita GRDP. One can see that CAR
(which manufactures handicrafts, clothes, processed coffee and various souvenirs for
tourists), CALABARZON, Central Luzon, Davao Region (with booming Davao City – Tagum
growth centers), Central Visayas (Metro Cebu), Northern Mindanao (oleochemicals, canned
pineapples, processed abaca, sintered ores) are areas with higher per capita GRDP because
they have relatively higher manufacturing sectors. Eastern Visayas has a significant
manufacturing sector but low per capita GRDP and high poverty incidence because its copper
smelting plant and a geothermal plant have been facing disruptions and problems for some
years now.
The other regions have a low manufacturing sector, some depend on construction to keep
their per capita GRDP high (such as Ilocos region). One can see that even in the regions with
high manufacturing, the products have low value added. In the export processing zones of
CALABARZON, Central Luzon, Cebu and CAR, the main products are electronic products that
are only in the assembly (labor-intensive) stage. The more advanced parts – microchips,
electric circuits and the like – have to be imported. The Philippines has hardly any steel or
petrochemical sector. Plastic factories depend a lot on imports. The other manufacturing-
oriented regions are focused on food or natural resource processing – again in the low end
of manufacturing.
Another alarming result in Table 19 is that the poverty incidence of the population does not
follow the per capita GRDP. All Mindanao regions from the richest Davao region to the poorest
BARMM had higher poverty incidence than Luzon and Visayan regions even if their per capita
GRDP was higher than the non-Mindanao regions. The first column is in descending order of
per capita GRDP, the last column is the poverty incidence among the population in the region.
Note that the last column is far from following a descending order. The Mindanao regions
were much poorer than non-Mindanao regions even if their per capita GRDP were higher.
Given the picture above that non-industrialization accompanies low income, the economists
and policy makers still want to depend on the markets and private sector for economic
direction, and they still hesitate to give productivity support and guidance to the
59
important economic sectors. Even the Philippines’ agricultural products – rice, corn, fruits,
vegetables – are not competitive with other countries because of lower technology and
productivity, bad infrastructure and irrigation.
The food inflation crisis in 2018 shows how much the country was dependent on imported
foods, rice and fishes to keep food prices artificially low. Even the agriculture and fishing
sectors do not receive any proper industrial policy, guidance and support from the state. The
rice tariffication law legislated in 2019, which removed import barriers to rice, did not improve
the productivity of rice and other agricultural products. The only related policy provides for
more unguided credit to cooperatives in the rice and agricultural sector, which are not viable
institutions for channeling funds. The result is that, because they have not reduced costs,
farmers are suffering from low prices of rice., Some are now silenced simply by the temporary
credit flows. But this is not economic development.
All these realities point to the need for a change in economic perspective – aiming at
industrial policy for the key economic sectors. Promoting progressive and well-planned
integrated economic programs and plans for key sectors and the entire economy (including
and especially manufacturing and agriculture) should be done by the policy makers and
political parties. Such plan should be presented to and consulted with the private sector,
revealed to all citizens via the media, discussed in government outlets, and debated on
during electoral processes.
The lack of dynamic economic progress and the persistent inequality in the Philippines
worsen because of the policies mentioned earlier about the political and economic elite.
Economists and civil society cite the Philippine system’s lax approach towards monopolies
and oligopolies. They call this regulatory capture. Examples are the Energy Regulatory
Commission’s lax handling of high power and energy usually attributed to the sole electricity
distributor in Metro Manila and surrounding provinces. This also includes what is perceived
as the failed implementation of the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (EPIRA), the
privatization effort of the government to address the high cost of electricity. Other examples
are the lack of attention of the Food and Drug Authority (FDA) in encouraging cheap generic
drugs due to alleged close ties of the FDA heads with large pharmaceutical firms; the alleged
addition of a close friend of the president to lead the entry of the third player in the
telecommunications sector.
All these consolidated monopoly or oligopoly powers which charge high prices and supply
inferior products (power outages, slow internet speed, frequent breakdowns in the light
railway systems) to the population at large. It is suggested that anti-trust and anti-
monopoly practices should be strengthened. The Philippine Competitiveness Council – which
regulate monopoly practices -- should be given more powers.
60
In agriculture, there is still the dominance of the monopoly traders providing inputs and loans
to the farmers, while paying for the peasants’ outputs at a discount, based on the advances
in inputs and loans. Unlike in other Southeast Asian economies, the farmers and farmers’
associations are not yet free from this yoke. The recent liberalization of rice imports in 2019
has aggravated the plight of farmers as rice prices sank.
In both rural and urban settings, real wages of salary workers have been unusually flat. They
have not risen enough over time despite productivity increases or improvements in skills and
technology. Daily real wages have been flat for all types of workers during the 10-year period
starting in 2007. There are two reasons for this. First, the lack of jobs for higher paid skilled
workers in the Philippines (because of the lack of industrialization and the dominance of a
labor surplus of unskilled, menial labor) keeps wages low. Second, the strict adherence to
regional minimum wages, which do not rise as much as prices in times of inflation, reduces
the purchasing power of the working class. A re-thinking of the current minimum wage and
flexible labor policies should be undertaken, alongside industrial policy, in order to stir up
the economy, upgrade skills and boost the industries.
61
Table 18: Per Capita GRDP, % Share of Economic Sector of GRDP (in current prices), Poverty Incidence of Population: All Regions of
Philippines
poverty incidence
% real estate, bus
% other servi-ces
% transp/ com/
% public admin
% trade, etc
% finan-cial
% ser-vices
of pop (%)
% mining
Per Capita
% const
% egw
% Agri
% mfg
% Ind
Region
serv
stor
GRDP (in
2000 prices)
NCR 253,893 0.2 15.4 0.0 9.7 2.8 2.9 84.5 4.5 30.7 11.5 19.7 6.3 11.7 2.3
CALABARZON 104,708 5.3 58.2 0.1 48.0 6.8 3.2 36.5 5.2 8.9 5.0 10.8 1.6 5.1 7.1
CAR 87,722 8.6 49.6 2.2 38.0 7.7 1.7 41.8 4.1 6.1 4.7 11.7 3.9 11.2 12.2
Philippines 86,370 9.3 30.7 0.8 19.1 7.7 3.1 60.0 5.1 18.5 8.4 12.8 4.5 9.8 16.6
Central Luzon 78,016 14.4 45.9 0.2 34.0 9.3 2.5 39.7 7.2 8.4 7.2 8.0 2.4 6.4 6.9
Davao Region 76,378 14.8 35.3 1.1 17.1 15.4 1.7 49.9 5.5 20.6 5.8 7.4 2.3 8.3 18.9
Central Visayas 76,024 6.3 35.2 0.7 19.7 13.3 1.5 58.5 6.3 17.2 8.9 11.8 3.1 11.2 17.5
Northern Mindanao 70,000 22.6 33.2 0.4 15.5 10.9 6.4 44.3 6.2 17.5 4.4 5.5 3.2 7.5 23.0
Soccsksargen 50,644 25.6 32.9 0.2 19.7 9.5 3.5 41.4 5.6 11.1 5.8 6.1 3.9 8.9 28.2
Western Visayas 46,440 20.2 24.5 3.0 6.2 14.2 1.2 55.3 8.2 14.4 8.4 6.9 4.5 12.9 16.4
Zamboanga Peninsula 45,265 19.6 32.6 0.2 20.0 11.5 0.9 47.8 6.3 11.8 6.3 6.0 5.9 11.5 32.7
MIMAROPA Region 43,715 24.6 30.4 15.1 3.7 11.0 0.6 45.0 8.9 5.7 5.8 6.7 5.6 12.3 15.1
Cagayan Valley 42,387 33.4 16.6 3.8 1.4 8.8 2.6 50.0 10.8 6.2 7.3 6.5 5.9 13.3 16.1
Eastern Visayas 38,598 15.9 39.3 0.3 14.3 13.2 11.5 44.8 9.1 6.3 6.4 5.7 6.6 10.8 30.9
Caraga 36,651 19.2 26.6 8.7 2.3 14.0 1.5 54.2 16.2 5.3 6.4 7.5 6.7 12.3 30.5
Bicol 29,369 21.4 24.8 2.7 3.0 15.0 4.2 53.8 8.4 8.6 8.5 8.8 7.7 11.7 26.8
Autonomous Region in
14,657 58.9 5.1 0.4 1.0 2.0 1.7 36.0 4.1 1.3 4.5 7.1 12.7 6.3 61.3
Muslim Mindanao
Source: PSA GRDP Tables Per Region, Per Capita GRDP, and Poverty Incidence 2018, www.psa.gov.ph
62
11.2. Unfinished agrarian and urban reforms
The lack of wealth distribution particularly in rural areas is oftentimes linked to the failure to
achieve an authentic agrarian reform program in the Philippines. For decades, this situation
has prevented increases in production and productivity and genuine improvements in
income and wealth distribution in the countryside, which would have stimulated rural
industrialization and developed linkages between the urban and industrial sectors. The
existence of monopoly traders, landlords and political dynasties, especially in the poorest
areas, perpetuates the unequal situation. A genuine agrarian reform will have to be planned
and implemented all over again. It should be one that is not dependent solely on credit, but
one that allows the farmers and fisherfolk to be entrepreneurial and profitable agents (free
from monopoly traders’ and landlords’ clutches) with enough technical and infrastructure
support (such as irrigation, farm-to-market roads). Urban reforms should also be in place for
informal settlers and low-income households in the urban areas that will enable them to
have decent jobs, housing, transportation and social services.
In agriculture, we still have the dominance of the monopoly traders providing inputs and
loans to the farmers, while paying for the peasants’ outputs at a discount, based on the
advances in inputs and loans. Surveys conducted by Oxfam and partners in 2017 across
hundreds of small-scale farmers and workers in supermarket supply chains across five
countries – including the Philippines – using the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale
(HFIAS) method and Oxfam’s food insecurity survey with women and men farmers, harvesting
workers and packers in Compostela and Mawab municipalities found that 75% of those
surveyed were classified as food insecure, 38% of whom as severely food insecure. The
report states that 72% of women small-scale banana farmers surveyed in the Philippines
said they worried about feeding their family in the previous month. The report also looked in
detail at working conditions of banana farmers in Mindanao who have signed ‘onerous’ or
‘unfair’ agribusiness venture agreements (AVAs) with large trading companies as part of a
lease agreement, ‘growership’ arrangement, or joint venture contract.
11.3. Conflict-prone areas are most affected
Many of the poorest areas are war-torn and conflict-ridden (especially in parts of Mindanao),
a situation that has hampered the entry of economic opportunities there. This study has
shown the disproportionately high poverty in BARMM, especially in the provinces of Sulu,
Basilan, Lanao del Sur, Tawi-Tawi, and Maguindanao. The Bangsamoro Organic Law
(achieved through substantial peace talks with the Moro Islamic Liberation Front or MILF) has
the potential to improve the situation in Mindanao. But, there are still other armed groups
that have not been included in peace negotiations.
63
11.4. Regressive tax system
Another cause implicated in income inequality is the fact that the tax system is regressive
and is dependent on sales and excise taxes (VAT on practically everything, including
services, simultaneous VAT and excise taxes on fuel, etc.). The rich and big corporations
underpay their taxes, thus the government’s infrastructure program is financed too little by
the rich and big corporations, while most of the poor and middle-class citizens shoulder the
financing primarily. It is imperative that the country addresses its low income-tax collection
caused by underpayments by the rich individuals and large corporations. Its tax effort (tax
revenues as a % of GDP) is lower than poorer countries like Vietnam and Cambodia. This may
call for a more progressive taxation system, and more effective operations by the Bureau of
Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs.
11.5. Small base for domestic demand because of workers’ and peasants’ low
incomes and the lack of industrial policy: an outdated neoliberal approach
The challenges mentioned earlier lead to the lack of or slow improvements in the situations
of workers and peasants, which works against a strong rise in domestic demand to spur
domestic industrialization (in agriculture, manufacturing, and services) and the need for a
firm industrial policy. A strong demand from a more prosperous rural and urban population
will bring about strong agricultural, industrial and service sectors or boost the capacity to
deliver high-quality products. Economists call this ‘economies of scale.’ There will be
dynamism among small, medium, and large firms and more interlinkages among them.
During the Arroyo government, the economy was externally led where exports (mainly
electronic labor-intensive assembly), business process outsourcing or BPO, and overseas
Filipinos workers (OFWs) were considered the main engines of growth. The subsequent
Aquino and Duterte governments were forced to rely more on domestic investments and
infrastructure building to spur the economy instead of relying on a global economy that has
been weak since the Great Financial Crisis of 2008-09.
In recent years, the domestic demand orientation has improved. But the infrastructure
building is still wanting as it faces absorptive capacity problems from government agencies,
and has not covered enough depressed areas. It does not come together with a suitable and
well-planned and integrated industrial policy in agriculture, manufacturing and services so
as to deliver genuine growth and development for the country.
As a sign of low productivity in the Philippine economy, the main paper shows a low
percentage of government expenditure in research and development (R&D) in GDP as well as
R&D personnel as a percent of the population, compared to competitive countries, say,
Thailand, China, Vietnam and Indonesia (Tables 19a and 19b).
64
Table 19a. Gross Domestic Expenditure on R&D (GERD) as a percentage of GDP
Country 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Bangladesh - - - - - -
Cambodia - - - 0.11823 - -
China 1.90582 1.99021 2.02114 2.05643 2.10826 2.1286
China, Hong Kong Special
0.72733 0.73017 0.74014 0.76183 0.79144 0.79972
Administrative Region
India - - - 0.61992 - -
Indonesia - 0.0847 - - 0.23937 0.23807
Japan 3.20908 3.31496 3.40022 3.27754 3.14081 3.20451
Lao People's Democratic
- - - - - -
Republic
Malaysia 1.09269 - 1.26275 1.30069 1.4377 -
Pakistan - 0.29285 - 0.24605 - 0.23597
Philippines - 0.13793 - - - -
Republic of Korea 4.02554 4.14853 4.28874 4.21702 4.22744 4.55324
Singapore 1.9944 1.98597 2.15996 2.28498 2.22448 -
Sri Lanka - 0.10081 0.09989 0.10871 - -
Thailand - 0.44164 0.47988 0.61593 0.78133 -
Viet Nam - 0.37359 - 0.44113 - 0.52654
Table 19b. Researchers per million inhabitants (full time equivalent)
Country 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Bangladesh - - - - - -
Cambodia - - - 30.37447 - -
China 1020.955 1073.218 1096.517 1158.908 1205.682 1234.778
China, Hong Kong Special
2988.292 3142.726 3312.362 3267.454 3404.838 3411.731
Administrative Region
India - - - 216.18207 - -
Indonesia - - - - 179.1774 215.72807
Japan 5032.821 5147.486 5328.649 5173.441 5209.970 5304.898
Lao People's
- - - - - -
Democratic Republic
Malaysia 1784.416 - 2029.607 2273.985 2357.917 -
Pakistan - 166.4386 - 293.6469 - 354.1302
Philippines - 187.6589 - - - -
Republic of Korea 6317.818 6415.122 6856.397 7045.295 7113.169 7514.391
Singapore 6477.190 6720.113 6729.679 - - -
Sri Lanka - 110.8771 99.74028 106.9805 - -
Thailand - 790.9095 964.1641 865.3958 1210.350 -
Viet Nam - 0.37359 - 0.44113 - 0.52654
65
11. Recommendations: Hard Tasks Ahead
This paper illustrated the causes of the disparities between the rich and the poor in the
Philippines and how the disparities can be resolved. The following are the major challenges
that need to be addressed:
1. Better wealth and income distribution policies.

- A more equitable regional wealth and income distribution with genuine agrarian
and urban reform programs
- A more progressive tax system relying on taxes of rich individuals and corporations
financing economic and social services and safety nets of the country
- A pro-poor and anti-monopoly economic program and justice system
2. A more progressive industrial, monetary/financial policy stance (i.e., agriculture,

industry, and service) by a developmental and forward-looking government and state
to ensure economic development in the right sectors involving all regions, interlinking
of industries, technologically progressing production. This will lead to a better skilled
workforce and growing domestic demand in the economy, which will, in turn, naturally
contribute to the dynamic economic growth and development of the economy.
- Promotion of progressive and well-planned integrated economic programs and
plans for key sectors and the entire economy by the government and the private
sector together with affected communities.
- A re-thinking of the current minimum wage and flexible labor policies practiced by
the government, alongside industrial policy to stir up the economy and to upscale
skills and industries.
3. Greater investment in economic and social development in regions found to be

lagging. Tackling regional disparities is urgently needed. Mindanao and, to a lesser
extent, Eastern Visayas and Bicol, have been left behind in both poverty reduction and
income generation.
4. Better access and quality in social services, especially health, education,

transportation, and public utilities; a more efficient and widespread social insurance
and safety nets system; and a better governance system to address vulnerabilities of
the majority of the population.
5. Better gender policies that provide more care infrastructure, facilities, technologies
and job opportunities for women. Education and information campaigns to promote
gender-sensitivity and inclusion. Better maternal care and reproductive rights in
order for women to positively contribute more to both the care and market economies.
66
6. Changes in methodologies to determine poverty, including current flaws in the
methodology of determining poverty thresholds. There is a need to consider the
vulnerabilities of lower-income households in determining the poverty threshold.
7. Implementation of the Bangsamoro Organic Law. The government must examine the
roots of armed conflict in Mindanao and ensure that aggrieved communities are able
to decide on matters that directly affect them. Women and youth must play a
meaningful role in shaping the agenda and in building a lasting peace.
An overarching issue in tackling poverty and inequality is the effect of COVID-19 in the short,
medium, and long terms. No doubt the pandemic and accompanying lockdowns and physical
distancing policies have massively increased and will further increase unemployment,
poverty and income disparities between the rich and the poor, like never before. Definitely,
finding jobs (even temporary ones) for the millions of unemployed and underemployed, and
unconditional transfers and safety nets to the millions affected by hunger, illnesses and loss
of access to basic necessities, will have to be undertaken. There will be difficult choices in
terms of priorities for government spending and where the financing will come from. A more
thoroughgoing analysis of the effects of COVID-19 is in order.
67
References
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Philippines,” Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS), Discussion Paper Series No.
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Albert, Jose Ramon and Jana Flor V. Vizmanos (2018), “Vulnerability to Poverty in the
Philippines: An Examination of Trends From 2003 to 2015,” Philippine Institute for
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Lopez, Melissa (2019),” ‘Build, Build, Build’: New projects dominate in overhaul of priority list,”:
CNN Philippines, November 13, 2019.
Moffatt, Mike (2020). “Essential Economics Terms: Kuznets Curve.” ThoughtCo, Feb. 11, 2020,
https://www.thoughtco.com/kuznets-curve-in-economics-1146122.
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computing-poverty-level/
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OXFAM
Oxfam is an international confederation of 20 organizations networked together in more than 90
countries, as part of a global movement for change, to build a future free from the injustice of poverty.
Please write to any of the agencies for further information, or visit www.oxfam.org.
69

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RESEARCH PAPER OCTOBER 2020

For more information, or to comment on this paper, email infoph@oxfam.org.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

3. Income Inequality ........................................................................................................................................ 10

5. Problems on the Methodology of Determining Poverty and Poverty Thresholds ............................ 31

6. Gender Disparities ...................................................................................................................................... 32

6.3. Maternal health and teenage pregnancies .....................................................................................................................................51

8. Multidimensional Poverty Index ............................................................................................................... 56

11.2. Unfinished agrarian and urban reforms .........................................................................................................................................63

11.3. Conflict-prone areas are most affected........................................................................................................................................63

11.4. Regressive tax system ..................................................................................................................................................................64

11. Recommendations: Hard Tasks Ahead ..................................................................................................... 66

Figure 1. Human Development Index and its components

Life expectance at birth Expected years of schooling Mean years of schooling

Figure 2. Growth rate of HDI from 1990 to 2018

Lao PDR 51.38

Viet Nam 45.89

Sri Lanka 24.8

Lao People's Democratic

Figure 7. Average Income, Average Expenditure and Average Savings of

Income Expenditure Savings

Figure 8. Gini Coefficient by Regions 2000-2018

2003 2006 2009 2012 2015 2018

3.4. Unequal income distribution is worsening – the share of NCR keeps on

4. Uneven Poverty Reduction Due to Regional Disparities:

The poverty incidence in BARMM is a particular cause of concern as it has deteriorated

Figure 9. Poverty Incidence in the Regions and the Philippines

Region 1991 2006 2009 2012 2015 Region 2015* 2018

Provinces 2006 2009 2012 2015 Provinces 2015* 2018

Expected Per Capita

Source: Social Weather Station (SWS), https://www.sws.org.ph/swsmain/artcldisppage/?artcsyscode=ART-20190720000106

Table 5 Gender Inequality Index (GII): Human Development Report

Labor Force Labor Force Participation Rate Men-Women

2008 Average 36,805 22,673 14,132 63.6 78.8 48.6 30.1

October 42,146 25,609 16,536 63.3 76.9 49.6 27.3

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Figure 11. Distribution of Working Women and Men

Mining and Quarrying

Water Supply; Sewerage, Waste Management

Administrative and Support Service Activities

Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation

Activities of Extra-Territorial Organizations

Professional, Scientific, and Technical Activities

Financial and Insurance Activities

Wholesale and Retail Trade; Repair of Motor

Other Service Activities

Activities of Households as Employers

Source: Figures 3 and 4, Abrigo and Franciso-Abrigo (2019), p. 6.

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

Combined 11.6 47.8 51.4 24.3 14.9 50.2 58.4 40

2013 2014 2015 2016 2017

% Males 43.3 43.0 43.7 41.5 41.2

% Females 56.7 57.0 56.3 58.5 58.8

6.3. Maternal health and teenage pregnancies

57 Malaysia 0.287 62 40 13.4 13.1 78.9 81.3 50.8 77.4

Table 16 Maternal mortality ratio (deaths per 100,000 live births)

Incomes, Transfers, Savings and

Figure 18. Incidence of Household Vulnerability by Poverty Status

Poor 40.5 44.9 14.6

Nonpoor 8.7 32.5 58.8

Poor 51.0 37.9 11.1 Highly Vulnerable