OKAY, so the country has weathered the financial crisis without having fallen into a financial disaster. Our markets are still going, and have apparently survived the worst. That deserves a pat on our collective backs. Now for the real picture.

How are the individual wage earners faring?

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This is a concern already raised by the International Labor Organization as it noted that growth in real wages have slowed in 2008 and is expected to drop even further by yearend as a result of the economic crisis.

"The continued deterioration of real wages worldwide raises serious questions about the true extent of an economic recovery, especially if government rescue packages are phased out too early. Wage deflation deprives national economies of much needed demand and seriously affects confidence," a news item about the ILO's newly-released "Global Wage Report: 2009 Update" quoted Manuela Tomei, Director, ILO Conditions of Work and Employment Programme and lead author of the study, as saying.

Cuts in work hours, unimplemented minimum wages, the growing informal sector, all these indicate unmonitored sufferings by the labor sector. We also know that the Pantawid Pamilya is but a short-term assistance. Most of all, we often hear people saying they can no longer afford what they used to.

In fact, a self-rated poverty survey by the non-government think-tank Ibon showed that seven out of ten Filipinos believe they are poor. Housewives all have stories of how they have been making do with smaller market baskets. More and more children are dropping out of school and making do with less full meals.

All these are saying something that we, as citizens of this country, must demand more insights about way beyond the press releases and lip service that government has been giving us.

It's not enough that businesses appear to still be going strong months after the world almost collapsed from a debilitating financial crisis that hit the world's developed countries. More than just business as usual, we should also demand insights on how the workers and their families are faring. Because it is these workers and families who will be racking up poverty statistics and straining social services if left to fend for themselves at poverty levels that they may be now languishing in.

Much as businessmen are here for profit, real growth and profitability can only be achieved if the manpower pool is compensated such that they can afford to sustain a life for themselves and their families. In the complex interrelated world we live in, the economic and physical health of our workers will ultimately determine the economic and physical health of our businesses. Purchasing power, it's called. Deny that of majority of our people and what we will get ultimately is a poor country, as poor as we are apparently headed toward becoming.