Reduce the Prices of Commodities

Workers all over the country keep an uproar on the unabated increase in prices of food and basic commodities. Leaders of various labor groups including the Workers Alliance in Region III (WAR 3) have been clamoring for wage increase to “temporarily” lessen the impact of the current crisis.

Based on the latest survey of the NSCB, a family of six needs at least P749 per day to sustain its basic necessities for food, utilities and other commodities. At present, laborers in Central Luzon receive an average of P158 to P287 per day while WAR 3 claims that almost half of the 3.4 million workers are underpaid.

Following the NSCB survey, a family earner who brings home P287 per day falls short of P462 to provide the needs of his wife and children. This is why the workers are in outrage. It seems like the government fails to see the huge problem. Workers are earning less but the prices of basic needs rise up thrice as high in just few months. No matter how bad you may be in Mathematics, it doesn’t need a genius to figure out the discrepancy.

Surprisingly, this is happening despite the fact that the price of oil in the world market has already reached its lowest at $43 per barrel. It is very dubious why the prices of basic commodities continue to increase even if the price of oil steadily drops.

In relation to this, private sector leaders in Region 3 are now saying that increasing the wages of laborers will not solve the current problem. They say that if business owners will be prompted to increase wages, they would either add up their losses to their products resulting to more increase in prices of basic commodities. Or they would be forced to lay-off workers to accommodate the salary adjustment.

But some sectors say that the increase in wages is not actually the long-term solution to this vicious cycle of labor and price increase. Some traders are looking into a better solution by asking the government to focus on reducing the production cost and prices of raw materials for producers and manufacturers that would result to cheaper or affordable products and commodities.

A regular earner will have more economic power despite his P287 daily income due to the eventual cut on prices of food and basic commodities.

I believe this would eventually solve the problem although it is indeed a long-term process and we need our political leaders’ sincerity and will to truly bring down prices of basic commodities. (30)