15.7 million Mexicans face unemployment during the COVID-19 crisis

The number of unemployed adult Mexicans rose to 15.7 million last April, 2.1 million more than the 13.6 million of the non-economically active population but that is available to work, as revealed by the Phone Survey on COVID-19 and the Labor Market, carried out by Mexico’s Geography and Statistics Agency (INEGI).

From the 13.6 million of the non-economically active population available to work, 87.1% (11.9 million) were people who were employed but absent or who wanted to work but that did not look for one due to COVID-19 , while 12.9% (1.7 million)were employed but absent or wanted to work but did not look for a job for other reasons (lack of raw materials, clients, vacations, etc.)

Likewise, from the 11.9 million of Mexico's population available to work that were absent from work or wanted to work but did not look for a job due to COVID-19 , 65.7% (7.8 million) were absent due to the pandemic and 34.3% (4.1 million) wanted to work but did not look for a job due to the health emergency.

In April, the survey revealed that the working population of 32.9 million people represents an employment rate of 48.2% from the adult population that uses phones.

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From 32.9 million working people, 7.2 million are temporarily absent with a labor bond that were suspended during the health emergency, a figure that represents 21.8% of the employed.

As a result of the physical distancing measures to mitigate the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic , 23.5% of the employed had to work from home in April; 42.3% reduced their working day during the health emergency; while 46.1% reduced the income derived from their work; 5% received some kind of government support, and 89.8% did not receive any kind of support.

Of all the employed, 75% said they had security and hygiene conditions at their work to face the health emergency whereas 25% do not have the same conditions.

On the other hand, 6.1 million subordinate and paid workers were suspended from their work during the crisis , a figure that is equivalent to 25.1% of the total; a number that represented 24.4% of men and 26.3% of women with the same job.

During the work suspension, 37.1% of men received their entire pay against 40.5% of women; likewise, 42.4% of men partially received their pay compared to 46.9% of women and, lastly, 20.5% of men and 12.6% of women did not receive any pay for their work,

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Independent workers account for a total of 8.4 million and represent 25.5% of the employed population. In April, 41.2% of them have problems at their business due to COVID-19 ; 32.7% reported a lack of clients and 6.1% reported other problems such as debt, price increases in raw materials and other products, and other issues, while 19.9% did not have any problem.

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