There is one world for the rich and powerful. The other is where we members of the hoi polloi live.
Listening to the press con of the President a few days ago, he says our inflation rate is less than 4%, but towards the end of the year, we will cross that number. In the world of the rich and powerful, that is nothing. You can even double it or triple it and they wouldn’t even give a damn. Thus, they don’t mind what the inflation numbers really are.
In our world, however, when there is inflation, no matter how small, we feel everybody’s pain. We cringe as we look at the tag prices of basic commodities. They look astronomical due to our difficulty to afford them.
But we know the real numbers. While high ranking officials say the inflation is just 4% what we know is almost ten time that. One kid used to buy chicheria at the corner sari-sari store at just about P20.00 per small plastic pack. The other day, the price went up to P30.00. That is almost 33% increase. Other basic commodity prices also increased by that rate or just a little bit lower.
Why are the things we the masses buy the easy targets for price increases? Because they can just ignore our grumblings or our complaints.
On the other hand, the powerful people can make people pay for unjustly increasing the prices of the things they buy. Or they are the ones setting the prices and they always look at those being bought by the masses as an easy source of revenue.
What they tell us when we complain about high prices is, “We are resilient and we can weather troubled times. That the Filipino can, even in the worst of time.”
But there is the other way. Tax sky high those being bought by the rich and the services they patronize.
For we, the masses have already hit rock bottom when it comes to tolerating high prices. There is just nothing anymore that can bee squeezed from us.**