Palace says doing everything to generate jobs for Pinoys

MANILA, Philippines - Malacañang on Tuesday maintained that efforts are underway to address the plight of the poor in the wake of a recent survey stating that the number of jobless Filipinos has risen by 100,000.

“We don’t wait for trickle down. We go directly to the ones who need the help from government. As you can see, we have several direct intervention programs that go straight to the fifth quintile or what we call the poorest of the poor,” Deputy Presidential Spokesperson Abigail Valte said in a press briefing.

Valte cited the Philhealth program that covers the needs of indigent patients and the conditional cash transfer, which assists poor families who send their children to school and who avail of health services

A Social Weather Stations (SWS) released Monday showed that the number of Filipinos without jobs has risen by 100,000 in the second quarter.

The higher unemployment data came amid claims by government that the economy is growing and that measures are being done to achieve inclusive growth.

The survey, which was conducted from June 28 to 30, said the unemployment rate climbed to 26.1 percent or 11.2 million in June from 25.4 percent or 11.1 million in March.

SWS said the 26.1 percent unemployed consists of nine percent who were retrenched, 12.3 percent who resigned and 4.8 percent who were first-time job seekers.

When asked about the seeming disconnect between economic growth and higher unemployment, Valte said agencies would study the results of the SWS survey.

“I can assure you, they will be looking at the results of the survey. However, in the past, we’ve always used the Labor Force Survey as our benchmark for unemployment,” she said.

“I’ve seen the bottom figures of the SWS but, perhaps, not the details yet. So we’ll defer comment until such time that the DOLE (Department of Labor and Employment) is able to get its hands on the SWS survey and place comparisons,” she added.

The failure to generate jobs despite an impressive growth has been described as a paradox by some sectors.

A recent BBC article by Saira Syed even labeled the growing economy’s failure to create jobs as the “Philippines’ puzzle.”

The article quoted Rajat Nag, managing director general of the Asian Development Bank, as saying that the Philippines is experiencing "jobless growth".

Nag said the Philippines has to invest much more in infrastructure to generate investments.