Tondo: Red Cross makes social survey there

Title

Language

English

Year

1933

Rights

In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted

Fulltext

November, 1933 THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL 19 Tondo: Red Cross Makes Social Survey There The Red Cross is in the midst of its yearly appeal for funds with which to carry on. To the press its case has been very sensibly pre sented, in that concise data have been furnished as to what wits done during the past year. Governor General -Frank Murphy's effort to place all entities making appeals to charity on a supervised business basis and in business relations with the government, for the general protection of the public, and to confine all authorized appeals of this sort to a fixed time in the year and have done with them, has pre cedent in the practice the Red Cross has long followed. It is the governor general who fixed the time of this year’s Red Cross appeal, as usual begin ning with Armistice Day and continuing to the end of the month. Even the Red Cross social survey of Tondo is worth a lot. No less than 5,193 families were included in this survey, summing some 30,000 persons. This is perhaps 1/12 of the city's population; being in a single poor district it is quite enough to reveal the worst conditions the public has to relieve. Families were ranked by ascertained monthly income into classes A, B, C and D. Classes C and D embraced fa milies having P15 or more income a month, it was decided that decent living standards in families of 5 or 6 members required an income of not less than P30 a month. The income of P15 a month was taken as the bare subsistence line; of all the 5,193 families surveyed, 1/4 were existing in poverty, half of these in abject poverty. On a basis of in come of P30 a month, nearly half of the 5,193 families -14' / of the 5,193 families had not this income and were existing below decent living standards—“crowded in insanitary homes, diet inadequate to maintain health, 21.2% of them with health problems, as against only 7.4% in classes C and D; out of 796 deaths during 3 months, 389 or 47.6% occurred without prior medical care—many families investigated held a fatalistic attitude toward disease.” The public health service: “A brief ex amination and prescription. . . many of these people need hospitalization which can not be given them. . . many lives arc sacrificed every year." Unemployment and irregular employment have of late increased among these people, but families in class A and B maintain living stan dards they afforded themselves in better times. This year's report respecting health, housing and sanitation checks closely with another made in 1927: the situation has for a long time been chronic, it has only been aggra vated by the depression. Class A families don't reach incomes of P6 a month, class B families don’t reach incomes of P15 a month, Class C families have incomes, often irregular, above 1*15 but below subsistence-level stan dards, Class D families have incomes more than P15 a month and are free from living problems. The ratio among classes A, B, C and D is 5.5, 7.43, 9.8 and 29.2; that is, 550 families below PG a month, 743 below P15 a month, 980 slightly above P15 a month, 2,920 in lower middle-class circumstances. Unemployment among heads of families was carefully classified by trades, 215 out of 35 in class A being unskilled workmen. Barbers irregularly employed earned P3.75 a month, carpenters Pl 1.55, cigarmakers P9.84, cocheros 1*8.58, fishermen P5.24, laborers P8, mechan ics (only 4) P23.80, painters PS.48, peddlers (53) 1*8.14, tailors 1*8.80, miscellaneous (42 out of the total of 581) 1*12.22. Classes A and B numbering 1,293 families were 6.3% tubercular, classes C and D only 1.8%. Worse, if anything, is the fate of the children of classes A and B who make shift to survive but are deprived of letters; the Red Cross found no less than 563 such children, of school age but not going to school, and even 344 in classes C and D: 202 lacked means, 11 were ill, 27 worked to aid their parents, 57 the schools could not accommodate, 35 were moronic, 6 had no birth certificates (apparently proof of legitimate birth is required by the public schools, a rule which would have kept anal phabetic a number of the greatest men of our age, among them prime ministers). Adult children, 16 years to 25 years old. to the number of 1,348 had no work of any kind. Such a report give a basis for intelligent relief. No less than 130 families willing to return to the provinces were found, 40 that had land in the provinces, 51 who had relatives owning land. Return of families to the prov inces has been undertaken by the governor general's committee on unemployment in Ma nila, and more than 1,000 families have been aided in getting back to the provinces. The Red Cross survey materially assisted this work. Of course no reader of this journal needs an extensive account of what the Red Cross does in the Philippines to spur him to renew his support of the Red Cross, to which every reader no doubt regularly subscribes; but this little summary of a single piece of good work done in Manila will reassure everyone that the Red Cross does all it can with the funds at its dis posal, that it is careful of its expenditures and works to good purpose. Four Merchants’ Opinions One merchant says: “... It is difficult to tell what we have learned from our experiences except that, speaking for our organization, we have all learned to be very humble.” An other merchant, as well known, says: “Success is going to be measured by our consistent everyday business, with balanced stocks in wanted staples and styles that are in demand; in the continued promotion of those goods.” A third says: “... the promotion of timely, wanted mer chandise is essential to our continued profit making; in fact, to our very existence.” A fourth says: “...and I cannot too strongly repeat that we in our store are firmly of the opinion that not one peso should be spent on the advertising of goods not in demand —and that not one peso less than what is required -to do a thorough job should be spent on the advertising of goods in demand.” When you place your advertising in the MANILA DAILY BULLETIN you are making a direct appeal to the buying power of Manila IN RESPONDING TO ADVERTISEMENTS PLEASE MENTION THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL

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