Top concerns for Filipinos

The same Pulse Asia poll shows that Filipinos are most appreciative of the Duterte administration's performance in responding to the needs of areas affected by calamities (86%).

Filipinos also approve of the government's work in protecting the welfare of OFWs (84%), fighting criminality (81%), promoting peace (71%), enforcing the rule of law (71%), protecting the environment (71%), fighting corruption in government (70%), increasing the pay of workers (68%), creating more jobs (67%), defending national territorial integrity (67%) and reducing poverty (53%).

Low approval ratings were recorded on the issue of controlling inflation (39%).

Higher pay for workers is still the top concern of Filipinos, the latest Pulse Asia survey shows.

The survey on urgent national concerns was conducted from March 23-28 using face-to-face interviews of 1,200 respondents aged 18 years old and above.

The top 10 national concerns deemed urgent are: 

• Increasing the pay of workers (50%)
• Controlling inflation (45%)
• Reducing poverty (35%)
• Creating more jobs (32%)
• Fighting criminality (27%)
• Fighting graft and corruption in government (22%)
• Increasing peace (22%)
• Reducing amount of taxes paid (15%)
• Protecting welfare of OFWs (13%)
• Enforcing the law on all whether influential or ordinary people (10%)

People who think that the top 3 concerns are urgent also increased compared to results in December last year. 

Those who think that pay of workers should rise went up by 11 percentage points from 39 percent in December 2017 to 50 percent in March 2018.

Meanwhile, those who think the hike in prices of goods should be controlled and that poverty must be reduced rose by 2 and 5 percentage points, respectively.