Though driving here can be stressful, and Doha sometimes feel like one enormous construction site, many Qatar residents tend to put a positive spin on life in here, according to a new report from Qatar University (QU).
QU’s Social and Economic Survey Research Institute (SESRI) polled more than 2,700 residents during March and April to gauge their opinions on life and economic prospects in the country for the Qatar Quarterly Survey.
Only responses to three questions from the survey were recently released by SESRI. According to those results, people here have high levels of consumer confidence, are optimistic about their personal financial situation and have an increasingly positive outlook on Qatar as a place to live, compared to a year ago.
This is despite month-on-month increases in the cost of living, and a 2013 survey conducted by SESRI that showed a third of blue-collars workers polled were “very dissatisfied” with their jobs.
The Qatar Quarterly Survey is an ongoing, large-scale research project that aims to provide unbiased opinion polling on questions of national interest to Qatar, t0 inform social, economic and employment policy.
A representative sample of the population is polled by telephone every three months to get their feedback on their personal financial situation, quality of life and the overall economy in Qatar.
Quality of life
To obtain their most recent results, researchers spoke to 894 Qatari nationals, 889 high-income expats and 934 low-income expats. The findings did not specify the salary ranges of those classified as “high” and “low” income.
The opinions were rated from 0 to 100, with 0 representing the most negative outlook and 100 the most positive.
Quizzed on their thoughts about Qatar as a place to live now, nationals rated the state at 92, up from 84 a year ago. High-income expats gave it a current rating of 78 (compared to 73 last year) while low-income expats rated it a 77 (compared to 69 last year).
And despite the number of infrastructure and building projects planned which will undoubtedly impact on traffic and getting around, people seem to think that life in Qatar will continue to improve. Asked about their opinions for the year ahead, Qataris rated it at 95, high-income expats at 83 and low-income expats gave it a rating of 84.
Consumer confidence
Residents were also asked about their own personal financial situations and for their confidence in the overall economy.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Qatari nationals had the highest consumer confidence – 90.8, followed by high-income expats (85.9), and then low-income expats (87.3).
A higher consumer confidence index is associated with more personal spending and economic expansion.
This could be partly explained by a general satisfaction with their current financial security, which each sector rated positively – Qataris at 86.8, high-income expats at 77.3 and low-income expats at 76.8.
What does the future hold?
When asked to score their consumer expectations, low-income expats appear to be the most hopeful. They recorded the largest point increase, rating it at 90.8 – up 14 points on their current view of the economy.
Qataris’ consumer expectations were at 92.1 and high-income expats at 88.7.
In a statement, SESRI Director and QU’s Associate Vice-President for Research Dr. Darwish Alemadi said:
“Our survey results reveal high consumer confidence levels among Qatari residents, who remain optimistic about the economy. Findings from the QQS serve as important markers for business owners and policymakers who are looking for indicators on consumer behavior.”
The optimism recorded in the survey results comes despite a number of reports that show Qatar is becoming an increasingly expensive place to live.
Earlier this year, Dubai-based company the Cost of Living Reports (CLR) rated Qatar as the most pricey nation to live in the Gulf, based on variety of living expenses, including housing and car rental rates, gym membership fees, doctor visits, health insurance, school fees and the price of food and utilities.
And figures released earlier this month by the Ministry of Development and Planning showed that Qatar’s consumer price index (CPI) had risen for the fourth consecutive month. Year-on-year, rents in Qatar have risen by 6.3 percent, and the cost of furnishings by 5.1 percent.
Thoughts?
I don’t;tend to trust statistics.
Yes, 9 times out of 10 you will find they are wrong… 😉
“Perhaps unsurprisingly, Qatari nationals had the highest consumer confidence – 90.8, followed by high-income expats (85.9), and then low-income expats (87.3).”
“When asked to score their consumer expectations, low-income expats appear to be the most hopeful. They recorded the largest point increase, rating it at 90.8 – up 14 points on their current view of the economy.”
Ummm seems to be an error? Were low income expats 90.8 or 87.3? And to think that low income expats are over high-income expats and just below qataris… this sounds like made up data in someones utopian mind.
lol confidence vs. expectations, still an error?
I’m going to capitalize on this “Bright Side.” I’m going to make t-shirts that say “Qatar: At Least It’s Not Yemen!”
You would have to see the questions presented to understand the figures correctly. Low income expats are they Sri-Lanka expats or European expats? who was questioned? At the moment it seems the current financial situation for low income expats is poor so these figures don’t add up.
“The opinions were rated from 0 to 100”. How exactly did that work? To get proper stats the questions and answers need to be clear, defined, fixed, or did people just give a qualitative statement and someone “objectively” decided to give it a certain rating?
Probably if its like other such surveys they ask the typical ‘on a scale of 0 to 10’ ratings question and then average it with other questions using a normalized 0-100 scale to make a thermometer index. This flavor of consumer confidence survey is asked all over the world based on the original one from Michigan and that’s what they do.
http://www.sca.isr.umich.edu/
Don’t let you ignorance feed the doubts of others, http://sesri.qu.edu.qa/Consumer-Confidence-Two
Do some research 🙂
Thank you for educating me, oh wise one. I will try not to infect anyone in the future
You are welcome 😉
talking about low income expats,, how low was that??you mean low that can be considered as high with respect to those have lowest income?? i doubt a low income expats would rate that high…