PH families considering themselves as ‘not poor’ soar to record high – SWS

Joseph Azil Buena

A recent Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey conducted from April 23 to 28 found that 42 percent of Filipino families now consider themselves “not poor,” reaching record-high levels since poverty self-rating began in 1985.

Photo Courtesy of The Philippine Star.

According to the survey, this percentage of “not poor” families was higher by 10 points than the 32 percent recorded in the first half of April, even surpassing the previous record of 36 percent in March 2025.

In line with this, data show that Filipino families who self-rated as “poor” dropped to 50 percent in the latter half of April compared to the 55 percent recorded in the first half.

The figures translate to roughly 14.1 million households rating themselves as poor.

This also followed three consecutive months of “slow but steady increases,” when self-rated poverty reached 50 percent in January, 51 percent in February, and 52 percent in March.

Families who considered themselves “borderline,” between poor and not poor, also reached a record low of 8 percent, surpassing the previous record of 11 percent in December 2024.

The survey revealed that 7.7 percent of families who now identify as poor were considered non-poor within the last one to four years, or so-called the “newly poor,” while 8.3 percent were non-poor five or more years ago.

Meanwhile, the remaining 34 percent have always rated themselves as poor.

While poverty self-ratings have dropped, the national median self-rated poverty threshold remained at 10,000 pesos in April, unchanged since December 2024, suggesting continued belt-tightening or reduced spending among poor families amid inflation.

The nationwide five-point drop in self-rated “poor” families was also largely driven by significant declines in Metro Manila and Mindanao, where ratings fell by 12 points and 9 points, respectively. 

However, almost all areas showed increases in families rating themselves as “not poor.”

In Metro Manila, families saw a 15-point increase to 60 percent, followed by Mindanao (up 13 points to 29 percent), Balance Luzon (up 7 points to 51 percent), and the Visayas (up 3 points to 24 percent).

The proportion of families identifying as “borderline” also declined, as Metro Manila and Balance Luzon both fell to 6 percent, while the Visayas and Mindanao recorded 9 and 10 percent, respectively.

Self-rated food poverty also fell sharply to 41 percent in April, a 10-point drop from 51 percent in December 2024, while those who identified as not food-poor surged to a record high of 51 percent.

The First Quarter 2025 Social Weather Survey was conducted from April 23 to 28 through face-to-face interviews of 1,500 adults nationwide: 600 in Balance Luzon (Luzon outside Metro Manila), and 300 each in Metro Manila, the Visayas, and Mindanao.

With sampling error margins of ±3 for national percentages, ±4 percent in Balance Luzon, and ±6 percent each for Metro Manila, the Visayas, and Mindanao, the area estimates were weighted by the Philippine Statistics Authority medium-population projections for 2025 to obtain the national estimates.