Wednesday, April 17, 2024
Marcela Valente
Gómez receives a regular monthly paycheck, an annual bonus salary and paid vacations. But she admits that she often feels anxious about living without labour protections or health insurance, and because no payments are being made towards a retirement pension – besides the fact that if she is laid off, she won’t receive any severance pay.
However, it is not only unskilled workers who suffer from precarious labour conditions in Argentina. Pablo Aiello, an engineer, earns a good income in a leading metal working factory and is satisfied with his lifestyle.
Nonetheless, he is plagued by a sense of uncertainty. "I would prefer to earn less but feel more secure," he told IPS.
Aiello has worked full-time for the same company for seven years. Yet he is not directly employed by the firm, but is contracted as a self-employed worker and paid professional fees for the work he does, on a monthly basis.
Fortunately he earns enough to afford a private health care provider and to make his own contributions to the social security system. But "what happens if I get sick, if I have an accident, or if they just decide overnight that they don’t need my services anymore?" he wonders.
But during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship, these social gains slowly began to be dismantled, and by the early 1990s, a full one-quarter of workers were not enrolled in the social security system and enjoyed no social protection or labour benefits.
That proportion continued to grow as unemployment climbed throughout the 1990s, when the government of Carlos Menem (1989-1999) adopted free-market reforms, privatised state enterprises and weakened enforcement of labour laws or pushed through reforms to make labour legislation more flexible.
By the time Argentina experienced its late 2001 economic meltdown, unemployment had soared to 20 percent, and nearly 39 percent of those who did work lacked social security coverage and labour protections – a proportion that had risen to 49.5 percent by the second half of 2003, when the country was just starting to pull out of its worst economic crisis ever.
Precarious working conditions even affect workers like Gómez who have a stable job but enjoy no labour benefits, as well as those who work temporary or part-time jobs and thus do not even receive the extra aguinaldo salary or paid vacations.
The situation also affects employees who are "disguised" as independent or self-employed workers, like Aiello.
Despite the economic recovery of the past three years and the resultant drop in unemployment, the number of workers with precarious jobs remains high in this South American country of 37 million.
The National Institute of Statistics and Census reported earlier this year that 47.5 percent of workers are not covered by the social security system and have no labour benefits.
The centre-left government of President Néstor Kirchner is concerned that the proportion of workers suffering precarious labour conditions has not shrunk in spite of the renewal of economic growth.
On Argentina’s initiative, the theme of the fourth Summit of the Americas – to be held in November in the Argentine resort city of Mar del Plata – is "Creating Jobs to Fight Poverty and Strengthen Democratic Governance". One of the key issues on the agenda is the need to foment "decent work".
In addition, the ministries of labour and social development are organising a seminar this month on "The State and the Reconfiguration of Social Protection", which will discuss the rising insecurity generated by employment lacking in labour protections.
One of the speakers at the seminar will be Robert Castel, director of research at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris.
One of the books written by the renowned sociologist is "The Metamorphosis of Social Questions: A Chronicle of Wage Earners", which analyses the phenomenon of mass unemployment and the growing precariousness of labour.
In an interview with IPS, Castel said it is becoming more and more frequent to come across people who make up the class of "the working poor."
He was referring to "the growing number of people who work but are unable to obtain the income or protection needed to avoid falling into poverty."
Castel, who uses the term "supernumerary" to refer to unemployed workers who have no hope of finding anything more than precarious or temporary jobs, said the category does not only include young people, women or those with little formal education.
"Today there is a quite widespread process of increased vulnerability that cuts across social categories," he said. "Of course it hits the poor hardest, but it also affects those who appeared to be privileged in the past, like professionals and young people with higher levels of education."
Nor is this increasing vulnerability only to be found in developing countries, he added. It is also seen in industrialised nations like France or Germany, except that in wealthy countries, the state has more abundant resources and is able to keep a minimal social safety net in place.
In Castel’s view, "the protections that the state provided several decades ago must be reformed and modified in today’s new, more dynamic circumstances, but they should in no way be scaled back or suppressed."