Awake from your economic slumber…Yee of middle class

Economic policy makers in any civilized society by default appreciate the centrality of consumer spending in the economic output at any given time. By tracking consumption habits within the economy, decision makers are able to gain important insights about any shifts in economic activity within the country. Besides, consumer spending creates majority of jobs in any given economy be it in manufacturing, ICT, agriculture, transport or wholesale and retail outlets.

The USA, the world’s largest and probably the most sophisticated economy tracks personal consumption expenditures monthly, quarterly and annually. According to their Bureau of Labuor Statistics October 2014 report, consumer spending accounted for about 71 per cent of the USA GDP and over 15 per cent of the Global GDP in 2012. This was a very strong recovery from the economic meltdown of 2007/2008 in which consumer spending had suffered the most severe decline since World War II.

At the driver’s seat in this consumption matrix in the US economy is the fairly well defined and characterized middle class populace. The same is replicate in almost all the strongest economies of Europe. Understandably, it is for the same reasons that policy makers in the Asian Tigers have consistently come up with creative incentives to stimulate consumption among the ranks of their populations that are culturally and historically pre-disposed to savings as opposed to consumption.

Vaguely defined

Shifting through the various sources of Kenya’s economic demographic data, it is hard to deduce any clear single measure that best describes and characterizes the country’s middle class. For instance, the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics describes the Kenyan middle class as those households that spend about Sh23,500 -199,000 a month. The African Development Bank defines it as households that spent about $2 – 20 a day (or about Sh200-2,000 at current exchange rates).

But these definitions ignore millions of our rural folks who produce for their own subsistence consumption in our villages. There are also thousands of folks in our cities and towns who remotely operate farms in their villages or frequently receive subsidies from their aging moms/grandpas in the villages to cushion themselves from the hard economic times (for evidence, one can take a ride in any city-bound bus from any village in the country or randomly search the car boots of folks driving from their villages).

In the absence of conclusive statistical characterization of the middle class, some analysts have used qualitative attributes like type of housing, level of education, shopping habits, ownership of automobiles and electronics, behaviours in social and public spaces among other endeavours considered “cool” in modern Kenya.

For purposes of this discussion, I shall describe the Kenyan middle class based on a set of four broad personal questions. One; do you have a college education and have a high affinity for the queen’s language as opposed to your mother tongue? Two; does the idea of a gated community highly appeal to you or frequently exaggerate your current residential address to a more socially acceptable one when among friends or meet old and new acquaintances?

Three; do you often find it cool telling colleagues and friends about how much you spent on your kids schooling or your annual family holidays? And four; do you find yourself always trooping to social media for updates of every of your daily adventures or to track those of your friends and/or real/imagined enemies?

If your answer to these questions is mostly yes, then it is you we seek out to take your rightful place in our economic system. Given, the world over the men and women in this income bracket are the ones who drive consumer spending and thus supports job creation along the value chain across majority of the sectors in the economy.

No, you must never apologise for your taste and preferences for the finer things in life. These are not only your constitutional rights, but also your birth right as a son or daughter of this beautiful land of ours, for as long as you earn them clean and square. 

Missing in action

From a casual trail of your shocked “musings” on social media over the recent Executive’s raid on your treasured disposable incomes that threaten your enjoyment of your rightful middle class entitlements, two hypotheses are crystal clear: One, as the custodians of the country’s economic policy choices you’ve either been disinterested or ignorant of your obligations to the poor masses; and two, policy makers and the political elites consider you as gullible and/or irrelevant for the country’s destiny. But let’s digest these two hypotheses further.

For a start, the Constitution of Kenya has guaranteed our sovereignty, right to information and mandatory meaningful engagement and resounding voice on how we are governed. Thus, by right the public must be constructively involved in any decision-making process that affects their welfare both in the present and that of future generations.

As a matter of fact, the pieces of legislations and policy documents that have rocked our perceived economic havens went through the mandatory public participation requirements. The question then is: where were we and why did we not speak out then?

Second; in our silence the political class, oiled by those with deep pockets (most likely pilfered from our civic contributions toward nation building) took captive the economy with the middle class welfare as their collateral. Given, politicians have a natural disdain for an informed middle class and would do anything within their power to keep them busy in the rat race economic status. They also naturally have no incentive to lift the masses from the bottom of the economic pyramid.

That explains why our political elites have created a very unequal society; keeps the country perpetually in an election mood; have turned our places of worship into competitive “big money sports” fields to bribe and silence men of clothe from their holy obligations as true voices of the governed masses; and why a Sh50 or Sh200 notes become a pricey commodity every election cycle to mortgage the masses off their inheritance.

Sacred obligations

So comrades, time has come when we MUST move from ranting and throwing tantrums on social media and thrust ourselves into the battle field. I in no way imply that you take to the streets unless it’s absolutely inevitable. All am saying is that lets exploit our constitutional rights and privileges and take charge of the debate of the Siamese economic and political twins in our land.

We must caucus in our estates to debate on our collective welfare and hold those governing us to account. We must turn our social gatherings into our policy brief forums. We must turn our frequent trips to our villages into civic education missions in sacred service of the nation.

We must reject our “tribe” identities as political vehicles for power hungry men and women in our midst. We must use our power of the ballot to vouch for the economy and consequently our collective well-being.

Dr Muinde is an economist