[{"bbox": [97, 153, 1133, 207], "category": "Text", "text": "and high productivity companies, for which the return on investment in physical and human capital must be ensured by the competitiveness of the activities."}, {"bbox": [97, 219, 1133, 298], "category": "Text", "text": "According to data from the Ministry of Labour, Employment and Social Security, out of almost 180,000 people enrolled in 2022 in various training courses offered by the Ministry, 41,982 people (less than a quarter) graduated (MTESS, 2022)."}, {"bbox": [97, 310, 1099, 390], "category": "Text", "text": "Employment informality is also due to low investment on worker training and low productivity of companies. The latter has an impact on limited expenses to cover the formalisation of employment, including working conditions and social security contributions."}, {"bbox": [97, 403, 1133, 458], "category": "Section-header", "text": "* **The weakness of the labour policy implies disarticulation of programmes and lack of coordination of actions to promote employment, in addition to the youth of the governing entity.**"}, {"bbox": [97, 470, 1133, 657], "category": "Text", "text": "Paraguay has made progress in strengthening public institutions and policy planning and development. The development of the National Employment Plan and the National Care Policy, the commitment of the MTESS and the INE to establish the Labour Market Information System, the implementation of the Social Protection System, are some examples. However, social protection coverage remains rather limited, and is far from reaching the entire population that, when unemployed, underemployment or in conditions of informality, lacks of social protection. This has three main causes: i. low financing; ii. difficult articulation/coordination of public actions/actors; iii. mismatch between labour demand and supply."}, {"bbox": [97, 668, 1133, 802], "category": "Text", "text": "The National Employment Plan (MTESS, 2021) is structured around three axes, with the purpose of developing workforce productivity and qualification. These are: 1: Promotion of the demand for decent work; 2: Increase in employability and work productivity; 3: Improvement of labour institutions around decent work. While the conceptual approach of the labour policy is consistent, the measurement criteria of the indicators would deserve some improvement."}, {"bbox": [97, 813, 1133, 921], "category": "Text", "text": "The implementation of a comprehensive labour policy, as a pillar of productive insertion, still suffers from serious problems to face the lack of protection. In this sense, the contributory circuit of social protection through the Instituto de Previsión Social (IPS) and the set of fiscal funds reached only 23.2% of the economically active population in 2020, according to the (INE, 2021)."}, {"bbox": [97, 932, 1133, 1038], "category": "Text", "text": "Labour policy is unbalanced because the weight of social protection that falls on the non-labour component of the set of unprotections is very high, i.e., the non-contributory social policy currently has little capacity for self-sustainability. It lacks resources based on the contribution of all workers, given that most of them are in the informal segment of the labor market."}, {"bbox": [97, 1050, 1133, 1155], "category": "Text", "text": "Labour policy involves at least two key actions: 1) the generation of financial and fiscal incentives for the generation and formalisation of employment, 2) the creation of labour conditions, especially the contribution to social security. This policy, articulated in a social protection system, protects the population from risks and vulnerabilities."}, {"bbox": [97, 1168, 1133, 1303], "category": "Text", "text": "Labour and employment policies are also important for care activities. Since 2022 there has been a National Care Policy, approved by the Social Cabinet of the Presidency of the Republic, which establishes economic care activities as an object of recognition, formalisation and professionalisation. The Policy recognises that, as part of the strengthening of the public labour and employment policy, it is necessary to address: 1) care services, 2) competencies for education and training in the provision of care and 3) information and knowledge related to care."}, {"bbox": [97, 1316, 1133, 1370], "category": "Section-header", "text": "* **The magnitude of micro-enterprises that absorb employment with low income and lack of labour protection reproduces informality due to the lack of various types of incentives.**"}, {"bbox": [97, 1381, 1133, 1515], "category": "Text", "text": "70% of the employed population earns less than the legal minimum wage, and only 60% of the salaried population has an employment contract. 23.3% of this population contributes to health insurance and only 22.7% contributes to a retirement fund (INE, 2022). Micro and small enterprises, representing the highest proportion of establishments in the labor market, have a high tax and fiscal burden to formalise employment (VAT registration, social security contributions)."}, {"bbox": [97, 1527, 1133, 1633], "category": "Text", "text": "According to data from the Ministry of Industry and Commerce (MIC), of the nearly 870,000 companies existing in Paraguay, 810,487 are microenterprises, which means that they make up 93.1% of the economic units. Of these microenterprises, it is estimated that 607,492 (75%) are informal, i.e., they are not registered in the single taxpayer registry and do not include their workers in the social security system (MIC, 2021)."}, {"bbox": [1038, 1682, 1143, 1707], "category": "Page-footer", "text": "Page 7 of 25"}]