Why so many expensive malls in the poor Philippines?
Even if they don’t buy anything expensive and are just enjoying airconditioning, and even if they live right across the mall and don’t even need to pay for public transport, they can always buy food at the supermarket, whether it’s cooking oil, sugar, a bar of soap, whatever it is in their budget that they really need.
the poor who are really poor are plenty, but those who can afford still says they are poor, steal water and electric connections,cheat or evade on taxes, borrow money and then proclaim bankruptcy, send their spouses overseas for work like a dog and they spent leisurely all the hard earned savings of the poor fellows out there. many malls are big but you did not observed the tenants whether they are regular and have been doing good in that business. The mall owners are the ones getting richer from the tenants while the tenants barely have good sales unless they are well known fast food chains. Look outside the malls, Many places are open for rent. Many big businesses have closed down. If not only for the very cheap produce of China. Many won’t be able to buy DVD players and pirated DVDs and CDs.
Yes, to give you a perspective, Southern California’s malls are small and few in between and many are relative ghost towns during the week. The weekend crowd are more like the Monday morning crowd in a normal mall in Metro Manila. And I agree malls are always full and are expanding in Manila while in SoCal and many other places in the USA the malls are often empty, depressing and many stores are closing, even entire malls are closing down. I don’t see that happening or ever happening there. Now you tell me? But to answer your question, like everywhere else there is a significant portion of the population who these malls cater to. And these are the above average, the rich, the filthy rich and the feeling rich. And they have the money to burn. Plus it is so much fun to shop in a real store than online. And the marketing of these stores are non-stop and seems to be working. Now the average person in Metro Manila may not have enough to eat but they will surely have the latest gadget or the
