He Statistics National Institute (INE) today released labor market data in Uruguay, corresponding to September, where, after a decline in August, an improvement was recorded in the levels of activity and employment, both comparing with the previous month and with the same month last year.
The Activity rate -which measures the number of people over 14 years of age who offer their work- rose to 63.8%, while the rate of employment It stood at 58.5%, three tenths above the previous month and almost 2% above what was recorded a year ago. Given that activity grew slightly more than employment, the rate of unemployment It rose one tenth and stood at 8.3%. It is the same unemployment rate that was recorded in September 2022.
According to these figures, the estimate of INE establishes that in September there were more than 1.7 million employed workers, 64 thousand more employed than was recorded a year ago. The number of unemployed It was estimated at 155 thousand, about 6,000 more than a year ago.
Evolution and causes
The employment data for September are particularly positive, especially if one remembers that trade in Uruguay is very shocked by the situation in Argentina, with a great exchange difference which encourages thousands of Uruguayans to “cross the pond” every weekend, to consume on the neighboring shore.
Likewise, merchants and representatives of trade and services unions diagnose an increase in smuggling for the same reason. We must also remember the direct and indirect impact of the drought, with affectation of employment directly and indirectly linked to agribusiness, agroindustries and related sectors.
Despite these and other factors, the Uruguayan labor market shows a positive trend. A possible explanation is the good dynamics that recently growing services such as global services and other local services are having. There it is worth highlighting once again the category of Information technology, as well as the audiovisual industry, entertainment, etc.
The increase in the real salary with low inflation are also factors to consider as elements of dynamics in consumption, even though part of this growing consumption is diverted towards Argentina.
Increase in informal employment
Finally, it should also be noted that – in recent months – an increase in informal employment, That is, employed workers who do not contribute to social security. The non-registration rate in this sense rose to 22.4% in September.
It should be remembered that this rate – which in the Uruguay was historically around 25% – had a sharp decline during the pandemic, which can be explained by the impact that mobility restrictions had on many usually informal and low-quality jobs.
This without leaving aside the medium-term effect of many measures and policies that aim to formalize employment in the economy, and that have been going on for many years. However, in recent months this decline in informality -which reached a minimum of 20%- has begun to reverse and rose to the aforementioned 22.4% in September. This would reflect that part of the employment recovery is in the informal sector.
Source: Ambito
