ZCZC
BCN-24
ARGENTINA-EMPLOYMENT
Surviving in Argentina as crisis causes layoffs
BUENOS AIRES, Oct 18, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Bruno Di Mauro spends his days in a
tent in front of the laboratory where he used to work, hoping that one day it
will resume its activities and give him back his livelihood.
“It’s very distressing. Most of us went out looking for work but didn’t
find anything, and for those that did, it’s precarious,” says the 28-year-old
former employee of Roux-Ocefa, a laboratory specializing in medicinal
products and serum.
The laboratory was closed on October 1 after 83 years, leaving 420 workers
jobless.
“Right now what’s most urgent is eating. I have colleagues who’ve fallen
into a deep depression, one died due to this depression, another committed
suicide. I try to remain upbeat,” added Di Mauro, who formed a workers’
cooperative in the hope of relaunching the lab.
Argentine unemployment rose to almost 10 percent in the second quarter of
2018, up almost two percent from the end of 2017.
In the Buenos Aires metropolitan area, where a quarter of Argentina’s 44
million population lives, that figure is 12.4 percent.
In Rosario, Argentina’s third city 300 kilometers (200 miles) north of the
capital, unemployment is at almost 18 percent for the under-30s.
When Ricardo Barrionuevo published an advertisement on October 1 for 10
job openings at his pizzeria, he received 1,000 applicants.
Argentina is in the midst of an economic crisis brought on by a crash in
confidence surrounding the currency.
The peso has lost around half of its value against the dollar this year,
inflation is expected to end 2018 at 40 percent and interest rates are up at
70 percent.
Although the economy grew three percent in the first quarter, it is
expected to shrink by 2.6 percent over the year.
Father of two Alex Cuello, 31, has become an odd-jobs man in order to
survive.
“I do a bit of everything. Last year there were odd jobs every day but now
I only get called once or twice a week on average. It’s getting desperate,”
he said.
MORE/HR/1005
ZCZC
BCN-25
ARGENTINA-EMPLOYMENT 2 BUENOS AIRES
– ‘Uber or stealing’ –
His eyes filling with tears, 63-year-old Pablo De Biase says he faces two
choices: “It was Uber or stealing, and I’m not going to steal.”
An electronics technician by trade, he spent two months in depression
after losing his job as a car wash attendant in March.
Now he drives around ferrying passengers for Uber, despite the fact it’s
not authorized in Buenos Aires, where some chauffeurs have complained of
being attacked by taxi drivers.
Alongside bicycle delivery jobs, it has become an increasingly common,
although unstable, source of employment.
Throughout his life, De Biase has alternated between economic successes
and abrupt falls. He’s been through inflation and devaluation. He’s lost
everything, only to rebuild from scratch.
But time is no longer on his side. Age is an important factor in the labor
market.
The economic crisis and accompanying austerity measures it has brought,
have made life even more taxing.
“It hurts living in Argentina, there’s a lot of sadness,” he says.
In September alone, 8,500 people were either made laid off or put on
forced leave with a reduced salary — a tenth of those due to companies
closing down, according to the national Center for Political Economics.
There were another 32,100 layoffs between January and August, with another
7,000 people put on forced leave.
Half of the layoffs came in the public sector, which has lost 32,000 jobs
— 13 percent of the workforce — since December 2015.
“In September there was a drop in employment, but not an abrupt one,”
Dante Sica, minister for Production and Work, said recently.
“It hasn’t grown since but has remained stable. The crash was basically in
the industrial sector but (employment) has been maintained in the service
sector.”
MORE/HR/1008
ZCZC
BCN-26
ARGENTINA-EMPLOYMENT 3 LAST BUENOS AIRES
– ‘Keep going’ –
Agronomist Renata Valgiusti, 53, was one of 400 people who lost their jobs
in the Agroindustry ministry in August, while another 300 were laid off in
April.
Like many public sector workers, though, Valgiusti received no
compensation as she was on an automatically renewing contract.
But with 20 years of experience in her profession, Valgiusti is not
letting her head drop.
“It’s a time to organize yourself and think about creative alternatives to
keep going,” she says.
Official figures look bad but experts believe the pinch is felt even
harder by undocumented workers, thought to make up 35 percent of the
workforce.
For every declared job lost, three undeclared ones are yanked.
“The landscape is super difficult,” says Patricia di Pinto, who has worked
for a recruitment consultancy for 11 years.
She says companies simply aren’t hiring, with construction and small
businesses worst affected.
International consultancy Willis Towers Watson says that 56 percent of 454
companies polled said they intend to lay off workers before the end of the
year. Back in March, that figure was only 18 percent.
BSS/AFP/HR/1010