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ECONOMY | 21-09-2023 13:48

Argentina's unemployment rate drops to 6.2%, but experts sound pensions alarm

Joblessness rate drops, yet four out of 10 wage-earners do not have pension contributions, warns INDEC.

Unemployment dropped to 6.2 percent of the working population in the second quarter of the year, below the 6.9 percent of this rate in the January-March period, according to the INDEC national statistics bureau.

INDEC’s sample is partial, since they only surveyed areas inhabited by 29.4 million people, when the total population is around 46 million. In their sample, there are 900,000 unemployed people.

Out of the total population employed, 9.7 million are wage-earners. 36.8 percent of whom work in the underground economy, i.e., they do not have pension contributions or health insurance, according to official data.

The non-working population, including children, is 15.4 million people (52.4 percent), while the working population is 14 million (47.6 percent).

In the second quarter of 2023, the workforce, which measures the working population out of the total population, reached 47.6 percent; the employment rate, gauging the proportion of people in work with respect to the total population, was 44.6%; and the unemployment rate, people out of work, available to work and actively seeking employment, as a proportion of the working population, was 6.2 percent.

The underemployment rate was 10.6 percent, whereas those in work seeking other employment and those not accounted for a total 11 percent of the working population.

As for specific populations, within the age bracket of 14 and over, divided by gender, the employment rate was 69.8 percent for men, while it was 51.5 percent for women.

Geographically speaking, the regions with the largest workforces were the Pampas (49.2 percent), Greater Buenos Aires (47.6 percent) and the Cuyo West (47 percent). The region with the lowest workforce was the Northwest (44.4 percent).

When it comes to the size of conurbations, in those with half a million inhabitants or more, the workforce (48 percent) was higher than in those under 500,000 (45.7 percent).

Within the working population (47.6 percent), it was noted that 74.2 percent of those in work are wage-earners, and 36.8 percent of them do not pay pension contributions.

On the other hand, 22.3 percent are freelancers, 3.2 percent are employers and 0.3 percent are unpaid family workers.

Among employed wage-earners, 4.5 percent used their own machinery/equipment.

Moreover, out of the total at work, 9.1 percent worked from home.

When analysing the population in work by educational level, over half (60.8 percent) have completed secondary school, while 39.2 percent have higher and university studies (complete and incomplete).

As for the qualifications of the main job, 55 percent have an operational job, 17.2 percent have technical qualifications, 18.3 percent are non-skilled workers, and 9.1 percent are professionals.

 

– TIMES/NA

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