UPDATE: Editor’s note: Added video of Abby Sarmiento taken by INQUIRER.net business editor Ma. Salve Duplito.

Filipinos spend too much on staying connected. When you don’t text, you’re not a good friend. When you don’t call, you’re a bad daughter. Husbands know full well the wrath of a woman untexted.

These days, cutting costs will have to include taking a second look at alternatives to the high cost of getting connected. In our household, only my 7-year old and the toddler don’t incur costs. There are six mobile phones in our household (two for the hubby), a landline and a DSL service.

This should be interesting for financial voyeurs . On a monthly basis, this is what we pay telcos :
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When “El Kapitan” was buying the government’s stake in Philippine National Bank more than 10 years ago, my teammates and I (in another publication) wrote a special report on him. While doing my research, I must have read truckloads of literature about the man -– from urban legends to PR-ish articles. Sadly, most of those publications are not available by Googling.

He has been painted as the best rags to riches story this side of the planet, to the most “well-connected” tycoon and everything in between. Lucio Tan is an enigmatic figure. The fact that he is one of Asia’s richest billionaire is not as interesting as how he got his billions.

I would have loved to a one-on-one interview 10 years ago, if only to ask him how he could remain unscathed after every Philippine president he has been closely linked to went down in political flames. But of course, we all know the answer to that.
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Vote:

a) Of course not! Subsidies are baaad.
b) It’s a source of corruption. Mark my words!
c) It’s a band-aid solution, but a few pesos are better than nothing.
d) Everybody’s doing it. The US and other countries are giving subsidies. Sige na nga, pwede na (It’s okay).
e) Hey, let’s not look a gift horse in the mouth!

A lot has been said about the government’s decision to give out cash transfers or subsidies to the poor. Comments range from the totally absurd to pure wisdom.

There have been three forms of subsidies thus far: the P500 cash transfer to households that consume at most 100 kilowatt hours a month which will cost government P2 billion, a P2-per-liter discount for drivers of jeepneys and other public utility vehicles, and a P300 subsidy for every child that goes to school.
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Inflation clocked in at 9.6 percent in May, a 9-year high, says our banner article today. Citigroup expects inflation to reach 8.3 percent for the entire year. At the core of this economic indicator are two basic things: prices are skyrocketing and our savings and investments are getting squeezed.

Should you be worried? What does a 9.6 percent figure mean?

First, it’s just a hair’s breadth away from double-digit inflation and is the highest since January 1999.
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Do you listen to economists? They will have kilometric things to say about the 5.2 percent gross domestic product announced by the government yesterday. Listen closely and see if they sound like this hilarious interpretation of Alan Greenspan’s latest comment on the economy by one of my favorite bloggers and Fortune columnist Stanley Bing.

“First we have Alan Greenspan whose further additions to his previously stated opinions about the situation is dutifully reported in the Financial Times and quoted in today’s Daily Briefing. Apparently we have a 50% chance of being in a recession… It seems, he says, that there is data indicating things are stabilizing, but it’s too early to tell. If we do have a recession, it won’t be that bad though, probably. He says. Unless, you know, a bunch of other stuff happens, in which case things could get worse.

Nyahaha. Sounds familiar?
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All these talk about Meralco and the high cost of electricity has made me wonder what the average Filipino household’s power bill looks like.

To make the comparison fair, why don’t we divide our electricity bill with the number of persons living in the house, including babies. I think the little darlings consume a bigger amount of electricity compared with the average person (need for airconditioning etc.)

For April, I paid P805.88 per person.

How does that compare with yours?
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(Photo from Agence France-Presse)

We hardly think about the few mouthfuls of rice left on our plate. Taken together, this daily rice wastage average 15 grams per head, or 1,280 tons per day and cost Filipinos P23 million. Did I say “daily”?!

Mind-boggling.

These are official figures from the Food and Nutrition Research Institute (FNRI), the principal research arm of the government on food and nutrition, that I caught this morning from the television show “Mornings on ANC”.
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Eight things you should not miss this week:

1. George Soros’ new book to be launched tomorrow on why the global economic collapse he predicted in 1998 that never came is now at our doorsteps. The New York times article here and International Herald Tribune here. You can even watch an exclusive CNBC interview with Soros himself. (I love TV on demand through the Internet)

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(Photo from Agence France-Presse)

Worsening poverty plus rising food prices, and what have you got? More and more households are definitely going to the poor house if this keeps up. There are indicators everywhere that high prices aren’t likely to go back down anytime in the future. I remember what Rico Hizon said during a recent interview: We are importing inflation from the US and China. Everywhere in Asia, prices are going up.

Here are some tips from a MoneySense article on how to make sure you’re not badly affected:

Watch out for the warning signs:

1. Uncontrolled spending and/or use of credit cards
2. Having loans you are having difficulty to pay
3. Not making and using a budget
4. Living a lifestyle you can’t afford
5. Lack of savings

To me, number five would go to number one. An inadequate buffer fund, absence of emergency stash – whatever you want to call it – should make ANYONE stop and take stock of your situation as if it’s the biggest red light on the street of personal finance.
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This is so not good.

Long and short of the bad news is, 3.8 million Filipinos or 700,000 million (sorry, my bad) families slipped below the poverty line in 2006. You know that creeping feeling that the poor is poorer and the rich is richer? That bitter taste in your morning pancake when you think about how economic growth is not trickling down to the poor? Here are the hard figures that prove it.

We now have a total of 4.7 million Filipino families who are hungry and can barely get by, as opposed to 4.0 million when the survey was last done in 2003. Government is blaming rising oil prices, calamities and low wages.

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