Brazil adds 309,000 jobs in June, continuing positive streak

For the sixth consecutive month, Brazil’s formal labor market registered a positive number of jobs created — with 309,114 net formal hires in June, per the Economy Ministry. 

Brazil has created 1.5 million jobs so far this year and, for the first time since the 2014-2016 crisis, it has returned to having over 40 million active formal contracts. Economy Minister Paulo Guedes attributes the positive numbers to mass vaccination, with 46 percent of the population having received at least one dose. “We’ve been creating 1 million net jobs every three to four months,” he says.

There are caveats to the minister’s optimism, however. While the survey used tallies the number of jobs created, it does not analyze the nature of these positions, giving equal weight to intermittent and full-time contracts.

Furthermore, underemployment helps mask the true extent of Brazil’s labor crisis. In January 2020, just over 23 percent of the Brazilian workforce was given fewer hours than they would like — a rate which shot up to 29 percent a year later. 

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