Dennis Minott | A balanced ledger but an unbalanced society

Jamaica is now praised internationally for a fiscal achievement few indebted developing countries have managed. By the end of March, public debt had fallen to 65.6 per cent of GDP, still far below the near-150 per cent burden of about a decade ago though slightly above the previous year’s 62.5 per cent. 

To multilateral lenders, this is an impressive macroeconomic story. Yet along the potholed corridors of rural St Andrew, in distressed communities of West Portland, and across Kingston’s overcrowded public passenger vehicles, another Jamaica is speaking.

That contrast raises an uncomfortable question: Has the Government of Jamaica shown greater practical empathy towards corporate capital than towards its poorest citizens?

The answer is not that ministers lack conscience. It is that the modern Jamaican state often operates with two different definitions of empathy. At the macro level, empathy means fiscal discipline: avoiding inflation, currency panic, debt default, and tax shocks. At street level, it means water in the pipe, safe roads, affordable food, reliable clinics, literate children, and wages that can carry a household through the week.

The Government can point to real achievements. The income-tax threshold rose to J$1,902,360 effective  April 1, 2026. Jamaica’s unemployment rate fell to 3.6 per cent in January 2026. PATH delivered more than J$9.1 billion in cash grants to over 240,000 Jamaicans in the last financial year. The Reverse Income Tax Credit offered a one-off J$20,000 payment to eligible low-income registered taxpayers. These are not imaginary interventions.

Yet they do not settle the deeper issues. A country may balance its books while leaving its social contract dangerously underfunded.

The disparity is clearest in the speed of state response. When large investors need roads, approvals, fiscal incentives, security arrangements, or policy certainty, the machinery of government often moves with impressive efficiency --"alacrity". But when ordinary Jamaicans demand the basics of civilised life, they are too often told to w-a-i-t. Rural communities endure unreliable water. Farmers struggle with secondary roads that make market access costly. Public hospitals and schools carry burdens that glossy investment brochures never show. The poor do not experience the state as absent. They experience it as slow, inconsistent, and, yes, "transactional"... let aff suppen, noh?

Minimum-wage policy illustrates the moral gap. From Wednesday, July 1, the national minimum wage moves to J$17,000 per 40-hour week, or J$425 per hour. That is progress in arithmetic but not necessarily dignity in lived experience. Against food prices, transport costs, rent, utilities, and school expenses, a statutory wage may still function less as a ladder than as a ledge.

Thus, two Jamaicas co-exist. One is fiscally disciplined, investor-facing, and praised in Washington and London. The other survives by hustle, remittances, informal trade, family sacrifice, and faith.

This asymmetry persists because Jamaica is a small, open, vulnerable economy. Capital can leave. The poor cannot. Governments, therefore, behave like anxious hosts, fearful that investors will migrate elsewhere unless continually reassured. Corporate actors possess lawyers, lobbyists, boards, trade associations, and access. The poor possess votes, but only periodically. Daily, they possess queues, bills, and patience.

That is why fiscal achievement must now be judged by social conversion. Debt reduction is a tool, not a deity. Stability matters because disorder punishes the poor first. But stability that does not become potable water, safer roads, stronger literacy, better healthcare, affordable housing, and real public safety remains morally incomplete.

True empathy cannot be merely preventive. It must be developmental. It is not enough to say the house did not burn down if the occupants inside are still hungry, unsafe, and unheard.

Jamaica has mastered the mathematics of austerity. It must now master the ethics of repair. Until the State applies the same urgency, ingenuity, and administrative force to the daily lives of ordinary Jamaicans as it applies to reassuring creditors and investors, the verdict will remain painful but fair: Jamaica’s macroeconomic ledger may be admirably balanced, but its social contract remains dangerously overdrawn.

Dennis Minott, PhD, is the CEO of A-QuEST-FAIR. Send feedback to: a_quest57@yahoo.com or columns@gleanerjm.com.