The Middle Class Must Be Diligent In 'Traveling' To Help Economic Recovery

JAKARTA - The Institute for Development of Economics and Finance (Indef) economic studies institute considers that the consumption of the middle class needs to be increased in order to improve national economic growth.

"The middle class needs to be encouraged by non-food and beverage consumption, such as transportation and tourism," said the Executive Director of Indef, Tauhid Ahmad quoted from Antara, Monday, November 9.

Currently, according to him, middle class people still tend to hold their consumption while waiting for the handling of COVID-19 cases in the country. "They do not believe in health problems," he said.

Therefore, he continued, the government needs to be able to increase its health protocol campaign efforts in clean and clear shopping centers, hotels, tourism, and restaurants.

"The government needs to improve the pattern of handling a pandemic by focusing on raising public awareness about the second wave of pandemics," he said.

In order to improve the national economy in the fourth quarter, Tauhid Ahmad also said that the government needed to accelerate government spending, both for capital expenditures and the National Economic Recovery Program (PEN).

In addition, he continued, changing the social assistance scheme (bansos) with a focus of 20 percent on the lowest group of people, with an increase in the amount of assistance up to IDR 1.5 million per household and a cash transfer scheme.

He added that the government also needs to make breakthroughs in job creation with a focus on labor-intensive infrastructure development, labor-intensive industries, and stimulus for non-restructured MSMEs.

On that occasion, Tauhid Ahmad asked the government to learn from other countries in making economic improvements.

"Our economic recovery is much slower than our trading partner countries. Compared with China, the US, Singapore, South Korea and Vietnam," he said.

Based on data from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS), Indonesia's economic growth has improved from minus 5.32 percent in the second quarter of 2020 to minus 3.49 percent in the third quarter of 2020.