The Duterte administration\u2019s declaration of an enhanced community\nquarantine over the whole of Luzon threatens to displace nearly 11 million\nworkers and informal sector earners, said research group IBON. The group said\nthat while government is correct to take all necessary measures to stop the\nspread of the COVID-19 virus, it is failing to do this in a way that protects\nthe poorest and most vulnerable Filipinos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The government declared an enhanced community quarantine,\ncolloquially called a lockdown, over the whole of Luzon for nearly a month\nstarting March 17, 2020 until April 13, 2020. In covering the eight regions of\nLuzon, the lockdown effectively spans three-fourths (73%) of the economy\nmeasured by gross domestic product (GDP) as of 2018. Luzon also covered 24.2\nmillion or 57% of total employment as of 2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
IBON estimated that the lockdown will potentially displace some 11\nmillion workers and informal sector earners. This was computed using the latest\navailable 2018 labor force survey (LFS) data and approximating the impact of\nthe lockdown guidelines announced last night by Cabinet Secretary and\nInter-Agency Task Force (IATF) spokesperson Karlo Nograles. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sec. Nograles said that only private establishments providing\nbasic necessities and production related to food and medicines will be allowed\nto operate. Exceptions explicitly stated include business process outsourcing\n(BPO) firms and export-oriented industries. All establishments still operating\nwill be required to adopt a strict skeletal workforce. Notably, mass public\ntransport will be suspended spanning buses, jeepneys, tricycles and trains to\nrestrict the movement of the population. Classes and school activities are\nsuspended at all levels. Most work in the Executive branch is also suspended.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
IBON correspondingly estimated varied degrees of displacement from\nthe outright suspensions, not being covered by exceptions, a skeletal\nworkforce, and a drop in customer traffic. Given the structure of economic\nactivity, the biggest number of affected jobs are going to be in the following\nsectors: 2.4 million construction jobs (assuming almost all affected); 2.4\nmillion wholesale and retail trade jobs (50% affected); 1.5 million transport\nand storage jobs (75%); 891,000 accommodation and food service jobs (75%); and\n832,000 other service jobs (50%).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
These are followed by: 731,000 information & communication and administrative & support service jobs (50% affected); 618,000 manufacturing jobs (25%); 395,000 agricultural jobs (assuming 10% affected from a skeletal workforce in agricultural establishments); 381,000 real estate and professional, scientific & technical jobs (assuming almost all affected); 360,000 education jobs (50%); 269,000 arts, entertainment and recreation jobs (assuming almost all affected); and conservatively 132,000 public sector jobs (10% affected assuming continued pay but a skeletal workforce).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The relatively least amount of potential displacements is in: 95,000 financial jobs (25% affected); 34,000 health and social work jobs (10%); 24,000 mining and quarrying jobs (25%); and 10,000 utility jobs (10%).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The group said that any disruptions in the livelihoods of\ndisplaced workers and informal sector earners will have grave consequences.\nThere are approximately 14.3 million families in Luzon. IBON initially estimated\nthat 3.9 million of these families have a monthly income of around Php11,000 or\nless, 2.2 million of between Php11,000-15,000, and 2.3 million of between\nPhp15,000-20,000. These 8.4 million families of around 32.5 million Filipinos\nhave very low incomes and little savings. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Poor and low-income families are the most at risk from even\nshort-term disruptions in earnings, said the group. Many among the 4.5 million\nfamilies in Luzon with monthly incomes between Php11,000-20,000 even risk being\npushed into poverty without expedient government support.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
IBON said that the government needs to act quickly and decisively\nto help the poorest and most vulnerable households. Among the most important\nsupport the Duterte administration can give during this serious public health\nemergency is to declare a freeze on workers\u2019 employment status and ensuring that\nthey will continue to receive their full pay. Luzon establishments can afford\nthis considering, for instance, the Php1.9 trillion in profits they made in\n2017, the group said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Informal sector earners can also be supported with a direct cash\nsubsidy, said the group. The administration had previously given unconditional\ncash transfers to the poorest 10 million families as a smokescreen for its\nregressive tax reforms. The mechanism created for this can be used to give a\nhealth emergency subsidy of Php1,500 per family for a total of just Php15\nbillion. This is about as much as the government is giving to support the\ntourism industry in its COVID-19 response package.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Stopping the spread of the COVID-19 virus does not need to mean\nthe spread of poverty, said IBON. ###<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NEWS<\/p>\n
The Duterte administration\u2019s declaration of an enhanced community quarantine over the whole of Luzon threatens to displace nearly 11 million workers and informal sector earners. While government is correct to take all necessary measures to stop the spread of the COVID-19 virus, it is failing to do this in a way that protects the poorest and most vulnerable Filipinos.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":9210,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_expiration-date-status":"saved","_expiration-date":0,"_expiration-date-type":"","_expiration-date-categories":[],"_expiration-date-options":[]},"categories":[2048,14],"tags":[2199,347,2202,1483,279,2204,2203,116],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9208"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9208"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9208\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9212,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9208\/revisions\/9212"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ibon.org\/tl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}