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Janvic Mateo - The Philippine Star
April 24, 2026 | 12:00am
The survey, conducted from March 24 to 31, found that quality of life of 50 percent of the respondents worsened compared to 12 months ago.
STAR / Ryan Baldemor
MANILA, Philippines — One in every two Filipinos experienced worse quality of life over the past year, the highest since 2021 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the latest survey by Social Weather Stations (SWS).
The survey, conducted from March 24 to 31, found that quality of life of 50 percent of the respondents worsened compared to 12 months ago.
It went up by 14 points, from 36 percent in November 2025, and was the highest since the 57 percent obtained in September 2021.
Only 23 percent said their lives improved, down from 29 percent, while respondents whose quality of life stayed the same fell from 34 percent to 26 percent.
The latest poll resulted in a “net gainers” score of -26, down from -7 in the November poll.
The net gainers score is the rounded off difference of those who said their lives improved from those who said their lives worsened.
The March 2026 scored is the lowest in over four years since the “extremely low” -44 in September 2021.
According to SWS, the net gainers score was generally negative until 2015 before improving in the succeeding years. It sharply declined during the COVID-19 lockdowns before recovering to near pre-pandemic levels in June 2023 and the second quarter of 2024.
It fell to single-digit levels last year.
The net gainers score fell across areas in the latest survey, with lowest among those in Metro Manila and Mindanao (-31, from -12 and +2, respectively), followed by those in the Visayas at -25 (from -14) and rest of Luzon at -23 (from -7).
It also dropped among respondents in urban and rural areas, across different age groups and educational attainment.
