A more competitive Saudi middle class
ON THE LAST World Economic Forum report, Saudi Arabia went down one place down from 17th to 18th in the Global Competitiveness Index. Although it maintained its second place in the region coming after Qatar in position 11, there are many rising concerns that economic competitiveness is not moving internally the way it should be.
While it seems that the country is doing great on a national level, many local and international economic observers have showed their fear over the impact of changes that are affecting Saudi society. They believe that the current economic movement is escalating the demise of the current Saudi middle class sector.
A recent study by the General Organization for Social Insurance (GOSI) has revealed the estimated number of middle class workforce to be in the range of 30 percent of the Saudi population.
This compares poorly with similar countries that have a 60 percent economically healthy middle class.
The conflicting reports over the Saudi income per individual, between international organizations such as the World Economic Forum, The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund on the one hand, and local Saudi economic agencies and researchers on the other, is mainly due to the increasing state income through rising oil prices. This is often a misleading indicator that does not reflect the reality of financial capacities of Saudi citizens.
This big misunderstanding is limiting the ability of economic planners to have a precise classification of individual income, which puts the Saudi middle class in great danger of losing its level of income that later on may lead them to be classified as working class.
Thus corrective measures need to be addressed to prevent more deterioration to the Saudi middle class. This will reflect on the standard of living, family and social stability in Saudi society. Many of the suggested solutions emphasize the concentration on providing better salaries in the public and private sectors — the development of stronger regulations and appropriate control measures to encourage the private sector to employ more Saudi nationals.
In addition to introducing strict controls on market prices of goods and services, and providing more support for small and medium enterprises that are owned and operated by middle class citizens.
We can look to similar experiences in countries that were previously faced with weak economic policies geared to revive the middle class.
We have all the capabilities needed to succeed in creating a successful strategy to expand the level of middle class in Saudi society. If we fail, we have only ourselves to blame.
A Tweet: "The intellectual is a middle-class product; if he is not born into the class he must soon insert himself into it, in order to exist." — Louise Bogan
