Half of Filipinos consider themselves poor – SWS September 2025 survey

(INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / RICHARD A. REYES)

MANILA, Philippines — Half or 50 percent of Filipinos consider themselves poor, a survey from Social Weather Stations (SWS) conducted from September 24 to 30 showed.

The SWS survey result released on Thursday evening also showed that 12 percent of the 1,500 adults across the country surveyed considered themselves “borderline poor” while 38 percent said they were not poor.

The 50 percent self-poverty rating is slightly higher than what was recorded during a similar survey done last June 2025, where 49 percent of respondents labeled themselves as poor. 

However, this is still lower than the 55 percent self-poverty rating recorded in April 2025, and the 63 percent in December 2024.

READ: 49% of Filipino families consider themselves poor, SWS poll shows

The 63 percent is also the highest self-poverty rating under the term of President R. Ferdinand Marcos Jr.

“The national Social Weather Survey of September 24-30, 2025 found 50 percent of Filipino families rating themselves as Mahirap or Poor, 12 percent rating themselves as Borderline (by placing themselves on a line dividing Poor and Not Poor), and 38 percent rating themselves as Hindi Mahirap or Not Poor,” SWS said in its report.

“The September 2025 Self-Rated Poor families of 50 percent was 1 point above the 49 percent in June 2025, and the same as the 50 percent on April 23-28, 2025 following a decline from 55 percent on April 11-15, 2025,” the polling firm added.

READ: Self-rated poverty slightly rises to 52% in March 2025 – SWS

The 50 percent self-poverty rating in September 2025 translates to roughly 14.2 million families, up from 13.7 million in June 2025.

“The percentage of respondent households rating themselves as poor was applied to the Philippine Statistics Authority medium-population projections for 2025 to arrive at the estimated numbers of Self-Rated Poor families,” SWS said.

“Self-Rated Poverty (SRP) has been measured 152 times since April 1983. It was 55 percent when first surveyed in April 1983 by the Development Academy of the Philippines (DAP), and peaked at 74 percent in the July 1985 survey by the Bishops-Businessmen’s Conference (BBC),” it added.

“Newly poor”

SWS also found out that 5.7 percent of the respondents who considered themselves as poor had never experienced being poor one to four years ago.

“The September 2025 survey asked the Self-Rated Poor families if they had ever experienced being non-poor (either not poor or borderline) in the past. The total percentage of poor families consists of 5.7 percent who were non-poor 1-4 years ago (“Newly Poor”), 8.7 percent who were non-poor five or more years ago (“Usually Poor”), and 36.0 percent who never experienced being non-poor,” SWS said.

“Of the estimated 14.2 million Self-Rated Poor families in September 2025, 1.6 million were Newly Poor, 2.4 million were Usually Poor, and 10.1 million were Always Poor,” it added.

The slightly higher overall self-poverty rating was fueled by increments in respondents from Metro Manila and Balance Luzon declaring themselves as self-poor. 

Metro Manila and Luzon recorded a 36 percent and 38 percent self-poverty rating in June 2025, and it has increased to 43 percent and 42 percent, respectively.

Respondents from Visayas meanwhile reported a drop in self-poverty ratings, from 60 percent in June 2025 to 54 percent in September 2025.  Mindanao’s figures, meanwhile, stayed the same at 69 percent.

The number of people who do not consider themselves poor also dropped — from 57 percent in June 2025 to 51 percent in September 2025 for Metro Manila; 52 percent to 49 percent for Luzon; 28 percent to 23 percent in Visayas; and 21 percent to 20 percent in Mindanao.

Those who considered themselves borderline poor in Visayas, meanwhile, dramatically increased, from 12 percent in June 2025 to 24 percent for September.

“The 1-point rise in the nationwide Self-Rated Poverty between June 2025 and September 2025 was due to increases in Metro Manila and Balance Luzon (or Luzon outside Metro Manila), combined with a decline in the Visayas and a steady percentage in Mindanao,” SWS said.

“[…] the percentage of Borderline families rose sharply from 12 percent to 24 percent in the Visayas.  However, it hardly changed from 8 percent to 7 percent in Metro Manila, 10 percent to 9 percent in Balance Luzon, and 10 percent to 11 percent in Mindanao,” it added.

Self-rated food poverty was at 41 percent, which did not change since April 2025. 

According to SWS, the steady numbers were borne out of a “decline in the Visayas, combined with an increase in Metro Manila and slight changes in Balance Luzon and Mindanao.”

SWS said that the survey was conducted through a face-to-face interview of 1,500 respondents — subdivided into 600 from Balance Luzon and 300 each from Metro Manila, Visayas, and Mindanao.

The polling firm maintains a sampling error margin of ±3% for national percentages, ±4% for Balance Luzon, and ±6% each for Metro Manila, the Visayas, and Mindanao. /gsg