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Mexico City, Mexico – “17 years old, immediately looking for work.”
“22-year-old looking for cleaning jobs, please help.”
“Looking for work,” writes an 18-year-old. “I have tattoos.”
These cries for help have been posted on a Facebook group for young people seeking employment in the Mexican city of Guadalajara last month.
Some claims are short and concise. Others provide more details on the struggles of young Mexicans who lost their jobs as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
“I’m a stylist, but I lost my job because of the pandemic,” wrote one young mother of three. “I’m looking for any work I can do, urgently, thank you.”
Although the Mexican economy is expected to grow by 5% this year, after hiring a whopping 8.2% in 2020, according to the International Monetary Fund, the recovery is not happening fast enough for the country’s young fighters.
More than half of all 10-month job losses that ended in Mexico in December 2020 were suffered by young people under the age of 29, the Mexican Social Security Institute reported.
The fighting in Mexico reflects a broader problem in the region.
One in six young people between the ages of 18 and 29 in Latin America and the Caribbean has left work since the pandemic began, according to a recent study by Canadian charity Cuso.
Andrea Olmos, who lives in the heart of Mexico City, is with her mother and grandfather. The 22-year-old resigned in March last year from an administrative position at an insurance company when the pandemic began in the Americas.
“It was the young people who lost their first job,” he told Al Jazeera.
Olmos said he was put at a disadvantage compared to older salaried employees because he was a contract worker, not a full-time employee. However, she fortunately considers herself a scholarship to participate in a youth tutoring program that will help her continue her studies online and help her establish employment in the future.
“I have classmates who have had to drop out of school for reasons related to the pandemic, and I have friends who have been looking for work and found nothing,” he said. “There’s almost no choice.”
Looking ahead to the announcement of possible youth struggles, there are about 44 million young people in education and at risk of being left out of work, according to the advocacy group Youth Alliance for Dignified Work.
Government dirt
Unlike other Latin American governments, the administration of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (also known as AMLO) did not step in with a large package of government-funded incentives to help businesses and homes survive the pandemic and recover from destruction.
Instead, the AMLO government provided very limited support to workers and small businesses. While this has helped control Mexico’s debt, the pandemic’s economic onslaught is deep and the recovery is slow.
Luis Mauricio Torres, coordinator of research operations and economic analysis at the Mexican Institute of Competitiveness (IMCO), the think tank told Al Jazeera that while there has been a general recovery in the Mexican labor market, “young people are still struggling to return to work.”
When they find work, Torres says, they end up in positions that are much safer and less paid in Mexico’s largest informal workplace.
There is almost no choice.
“It’s hard to get a formal job in Mexico,” Torres said. “And it’s going to be harder for young people right now because it’s a big cost [of formal hiring] for companies. They will support other populations with more experience or credentials. “
This means that young people are still behind the generations that were before them.
Olmos says he sees what is happening in real time as more and more young people take on unsafe jobs, such as distributing food.
“Now you need a college degree in many jobs where you didn’t have it before,” he said.
Sergio, who asked Al Jazeera to retain his last name, worked as a bicycle distributor in an app-based meal distribution service after losing his job with a hospitality company in the waves of the first closure last year.
“We’re a lot of people who worked in the hospitality industry – in the hospitality industry, at events, in restaurants – now we were doing Uber Eats, Rappi and DiDi deliveries,” the 25-year-old told Al Jazeera.
Sergio, who lives in Mexico City with his parents and younger siblings, said he enjoys the job of delivering bikes and that his employer treats him well. And he’s not worried about job security. As a contractor, an avid bike rider can set his own hours. He also says he earns a little more money than his previous job, mostly because of tips.
But he admits there is a lot of uncertainty. When businesses are slow, there are fewer hours to work and earn.
This insecurity, Torres says, makes young people “weaker” in the face of diseases in the Mexican labor market, including informality, precariousness, and exploitation.
Torres says labor market reform would address this path, noting that some progress has been made by the government, including placing restrictions on outsourcing, setting minimum wage regulations, and reforming pension funds.
But he says more can be done to help the nation’s young and unemployed.
“I believe there is a space at the state and federal level to design and implement programs specifically designed for youth, to help them – to connect unemployed youth with the productive sector, to develop human capital and skills,” he said.
Mrs. Olmos agrees. “Believe in us,” he asks employers. “We have the knowledge and experience.”
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