Middle Class Survey
Emerging Asia’s Rising Middle Class
By Clarence Wong
Chief Economist
A large-scale consumer survey of Emerging Asia Middle Class shows clear signs of optimism despite economic headwinds. This segment of consumers sees health, wellbeing and finances as key life priorities and purposes. They are optimistic of their socio-economic progression and have strong entrepreneurial aspiration. Yet, despite good healthcare coverage among the middle class, there is still a significant protection gap. These are some of the key observations from Peak Re’s inaugural Emerging Asia Middle Class survey. Find out more.
Emerging Asian markets accounted for less than 5% of global output in 1990, which has since risen to 26% in 2022. The outlook is sanguine, despite cyclical challenges. This, in turn, supports the rise of an ever-larger middle class in the region. According to a study by McKinsey & Company, Asia could drive half of the future global consumption growth to 2030, with a key contributor coming from the region’s emerging middle-class.
Understanding the usage, behaviour and attitude of middle-class Asian is thus of paramount importance to the successful tapping of this vital market segment. These aspiring consumers direly need insurance protection as they begin to accumulate wealth and assets and make plans for their children’s education and retirement.
In partnership with Intuit Research, Peak Re conducted a regional survey in the second quarter of 2022 to gauge the unique features of the Emerging Asian middle-class. The results are intended to facilitate a better understanding of this important segment’s needs and preferences and stimulate dialogues among stakeholders to serve these consumers better. The results are presented in a data compendium as we believe open-mindedness is important to foster informed decisions. Wherever appropriate, we draw comparisons with the middle-class in Mature Asia to highlight key differences.
This yields many interesting observations. For example, there are clear signs of optimism for Emerging Asia middle-class regarding their financial well-being, social mobility and success of their children compared to their counterparts in Mature Asia. They are also more health conscious and more inclined to adopt healthy actions, yet they are acutely aware of the severe financial stress from medical events. Similarly, in personal finance, Emerging Asia middle-class are more confident about their financial literacy and are more disciplined in spending and saving. This optimism is reflected in more of them having the ambition to become an entrepreneur or expecting better work-life balance offers from employers.
To summarise the vast troves of information and insights in a few paragraphs is almost mission impossible. More importantly, the connection to business and informed decisions will primarily be firm-specific. To this end, Peak Re will follow up with a more granular digest of each of the thematic topics covered in this compendium.
