Latin America and the Caribbean at least 140 million people work informally
Havana, June 27 (RHC)-- In Latin America and the Caribbean at least 140 million people work informally, a figure that represents today around 50 percent of workers according to the International Labor Organization (ILO).
This situation means that five out of every 10 workers are informal, something that is very significant in retail trade activities, i.e. street vending, as is the case with more than half of the total number of people employed in at least nine Latin American countries.
For example, in Peru, an estimated 68.4 percent of workers in 2019 were employed in the informal sector. In Argentina, this percentage rose to 49.4; while in Uruguay and Chile, about a quarter exercise paid activities in the informal labor market.
With the COVID-19 pandemic, many weaknesses have been exacerbated, structural flaws in economies around the world, particularly in Latin America, including informality, precarious work, inequality and, above all, the absence of protection programs.
According to the permanent secretary of the Latin American and Caribbean Economic System (SELA), the Peruvian Javier Paulinich, although informality is an alternative to unemployment, one of its impacts on the economy is that countries have low productivity, in addition to the lack of protection for those who work informally without access to labor or social benefits.
The ILO warned that 28 million Latin Americans are living in working poverty as a result of the pandemic, which will leave an unemployment rate of 11.1 percent in the region this year.
He also estimated that although a recovery in employment rates is expected, it will not reach the levels of the loss recorded as a consequence of the Covid-19 pandemic, a disease caused by the SARS-Cov-2 virus.
There will be a regeneration of jobs, but slowly and with the risk of greater inequalities than at the beginning of the pandemic, which is why a global strategy that puts people at the center of public policies is needed.
