The petite bourgeoisie today includes small business owners and educated professionals. Inspired by the capitalists, they wish to make more money and achieve a higher status. (“Petite bourgeoisie”, n.d.) Now, its definition has evolved to include people who operate small businesses and work professional jobs (i.e. office employees, lawyers, professors) in the Philippines.
- In the early years, the petite bourgeoisie were the merchants who held a small part of the means of production in society. In the Philippines, the petite bourgeoisie today is comprised of small business owners and professionals who have capitalist aspirations.
- Often referred to as the gitnang uri, they have the privileges of education and avoiding labor or agricultural work. They are in between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, but they are still oppressed in the Philippine society as everyone under the 1% are.
- Some join forces with the agricultural and labor workers in fighting the oppressive and the powerful 1% of Philippine society. They are part of activist groups, national democratic movement organizations, unions, campus publications & clubs, and other organizations. This is their way of calling for action and proper rights to the proletariat and the peasantry.
The State of the Petite Bourgeoisie
This class is the lower end of the middle class found above the agricultural and labor workers and below the national and comprador bourgeoisie—they are the “transitional class” of society. The petite bourgeoisie is comprised of merchants who owned a small part of the means of production. (“Petite bourgeoisie”, n.d. & Oxford Reference, n.d.) Later on, intellectuals and educated professionals joined the petite bourgeoisie, for they failed to radicalize and truly be part of the proletariat. (Brym, 2001)
The biggest privilege that the petite bourgeoisie is a college education. Out of 100 Filipinos who should be in college, only 33 are enrolled in higher education institutions such as state universities and colleges, local universities and colleges, and technical-vocation education and training programs. (Andres, 2019) Often, people say that if you’ve graduated from university, you are part of the petite bourgeoisie or a higher class. People who’ve finished their education have a degree to back them up as they apply to companies or run after a decent career; they also have the choice to avoid labor work that the working class grabs onto to put food on the table.
Despite the education they’ve attained, they still face similar challenges to those of the working class. Capitalism exploits any worker, and even workers of the petite bourgeoisie suffer from exploitation while the capitalist profits as Marx says. The capitalist pays less than what the work of the employee is worth in the company so that they can profit. (CrashCourse, 2017 & Nolita Werrett, 2016)
Furthermore, despite the doors of opportunities opening, fresh graduates do not get a job immediately because of the demand for prior work experience. Graduating from college does not secure a job but simply offers more opportunities. In the Philippine job market, 23.9 of the unemployed are college graduates while 26.4% are junior high school graduates. (Cepeda, 2020) Moreover, employees are still treated as commodities to the capitalist despite bringing intellectual value to the company. If they are in a low position, they suffer the risk of losing their job over a mistake.
Various professions in the Philippines do not see an increase in their salaries while the professions who put forward what the 1% want—this includes the police force and the military. During President Duterte’s administration, the president doubled the salary for cops and soldiers—the people who say they protect the people but protect only the ruling class—will receive an average increase of 72.18% for all ranks by 2019. (Department of Budget and Management, 2018) On the other hand, professionals in the field of education, healthcare, and other fields have not seen a significant increase in their salaries. Teachers’ salaries will improve by P6,000 across 4 years, depending on their salary grade levels—not quite the same with the 50% to 100% increase for uniformed personnel. (Bueza, 2020) Health workers continue to ask the government for an increase in the salaries of medical frontliners as nothing has changed since the COVID-19 pandemic was declared early last year. (Lalu, 2021)
Lastly, in a typical office setting, they work five days a week, nine to five, with only two days to treat as rest days. The productivity—toxic productivity—that the capitalist pushes forward leads employees to burnout and exhaustion. Various articles have written that “burnout is a capitalism problem, not a millennial one”—it explains how our economy is the reason for burnout of labor workers and professionals alike. (Smith, 2019) In a Vox interview by Sean Illing (2019), Malcolm Harris mentioned the increase in the rate of exploitation with workers working longer, harder, and more efficiently and the decrease in compensation. He said, “...Millennials have been forced to grow up and enter the labor market under these dynamics, and we’ve internalized this drive to produce as much as we can for as little as possible… And because wages are stagnant and exploitation is up, competition among workers is up too. As individuals, the best thing we can do for ourselves is work harder, learn to code, etc. But we’re not individuals, not as far as bosses are concerned. The vast majority of us are (replaceable) workers, and by working harder for less, we’re undermining ourselves as a class. It’s a vicious cycle.”
While employees go through their struggles, those who’ve established small businesses also fail—a ton do. To start, they need capital which they often would owe from someone or a bank; later on, they do not make enough to pay back the capital and instead of making more money, they lose more money.
The struggles of starting entrepreneurs boil down to the control of the 1% in capitalism. In our society, the 1% holds monopolies and connections with the other members of the 1%. They rack up profit, and they leave little to no space for start-ups.
The Proletariat of the Bourgeoisie
Despite being called the bourgeoisie, they are not the capitalists who take advantage of the lower class even though they adhere to the capitalist ideals and lifestyles. They are the middle class who seem to be part of the bourgeoisie but are still working for the 1%.
As discussed in the state of the petite bourgeoisie, they still suffer the exploitation from the true capitalists, the powers-that-be, or the uber-rich. Despite professionals of the petite bourgeoisie failing to radicalize and be recognized as the proletariat, the two classes go through similar hardships. After all, the petite bourgeoisie is closer to the proletariat than the comprador bourgeoisie.
The 99% of society will always be far from the 1% who holds power and gold.
Radical Love for the People
Despite most of the petite bourgeoisie not radicalizing, some people from this class chose to stand with the people on the streets. As the agricultural and labor workers protest for their rights, they learn and stand with them. They are organized and devoted to their advocacies.
Summary
- The petite bourgeoisie consists of small business owners and educated professionals.
- Just like the agricultural and labor workers, they go through similar hardships and challenges. Despite the privilege of education, job security and salary is low; they still work for the 1% of Philippine society. The small capitalists who establish businesses are also at a disadvantage because of the big businesses that essentially control the market.
- A number of the petite bourgeoisie are part of activist groups. They stand with the marginalized sectors of society—the proletariat.
