CIS   24481
CENTRO DE INVESTIGACIONES SOCIALES
Unidad Ejecutora - UE
congresos y reuniones científicas
Título:
New Rirghts, Old Protections: the New Regulation for Domestic Workers in Argentina
Autor/es:
POBLETE, LORENA
Lugar:
Montreal
Reunión:
Conferencia; The Labour Law and Development Speaker Series, Faculty of Law, McGill University; 2015
Institución organizadora:
LLDRL, Faculty of Law, McGill University
Resumen:
Domestic work in Argentina constitutes a significant portion of female work. Namely, 17% of all woman working and 23% wage-earners. In most cases, domestic workers are over 40 years old (56.6%); and 33.4% between 25 and 39 years old. It is characterized by precariousness. Most female workers cannot complete the work day. Only 19.6% works over 40 weekly hours, 39.6% works between 16 and 39 weekly hours, 32.4% works between 6 and 15 hours, and 9.3% works less than 6 hours. Regarding hiring terms, most workers perform activities for a single employer and, within this group, very few work and reside in the employer's household (around 2%). However, the number of workers engaged by a single employer has decreased between 2004 and 2013, and the number of workers engaged by two or more employers has increased accordingly. Registration level in this sector is very low. Despite the fact that the registration rate has increased during the last years (from 5% in 2003 to 16% in 2013), 84% of domestic workers still remain unregistered. That means unregistered workers do not have access to the social security system and their wages are not aligned with the levels prescribed by the State. In fact, the average monthly wage of unregistered workers is 48% less than the average monthly wage of registered workers. For that reason, after a tree-year debate during which different bills were scrutinized, law 26.844 was passed in 2013. This law constitutes a legal advancement, comparing the preexisting regulation. Thus, labor and social rights are awarded to all domestic workers regardless of the amount of worked hours. By working for an hour (minimum), they are entitled to be protected by the law. Nevertheless, the implementation of labor and social rights recognized at regulation level has proven puzzling. A gap between the law's intention and the real acknowledgement of labor and social rights may be clearly observed. Using -as methodology- the analysis of regulations (executive orders, resolutions and laws) and parliament debates, the aim of this paper is to understand the effects of the social protection regime prescribed by the new law. For that purpose, this paper is divided into three parts. The first part presents an analysis of the new rights granted to domestic workers by law 26.844. The second part analyses the evolution of social protection regime for domestic workers to show the ambiguities inherent of this system. Finally, in the third section, by the analysis of the application of this special social protection regime, the paper seeks to understand the consequences of this regime for domestic workers.