The Covid-19 pandemic as an opportunity for normative reforms. The case of paid domestic work in Colombia, Chile, and Uruguay.

POBLETE, LORENA

Glasgow

Congreso; International Labour Process Conference; 2023

ILPC

Most domestic workers in Latin America earn low wages and have no formal contract. When the COVID-19 pandemic began, the situation of these workers became even more precarious, as working time was reduced for many, and as a result, incomes declined. Many other workers suffered unpaid suspensions or layoffs without severance pay. As a result, governments throughout the region sought to develop new strategies to guarantee the incomes of domestic workers. Adopting a comparative perspective, the paper seeks to analyze how these three countries used and modified unemployment insurance during the COVID-19 pandemic crises. Since these are the only Latin American countries that include domestic workers in unemployment insurance, it is interesting to understand how the pandemic crisis triggered changes in regulations that allowed domestic workers to benefit from social security protections. In Colombia, domestic workers have been entitled to unemployment insurance since 2013, when ILO Convention 189 was introduced into national labor regulations. Consequently, they were able to benefit from them. Registered domestic workers (who had contributed to the social security system for one year, continuously or discontinuously, for at least five years) could receive two legal minimum wages in three consecutive installments for the duration of the Covid-19 pandemic. Subsequently, in June 2020, the government reduced the minimum contribution (to at least 6 months) to make unemployment insurance more accessible to those who had lost their jobs after March 12, 2020.In Uruguay, paid domestic workers have been eligible for unemployment insurance benefits since 2006, when the law regulating the sector was passed. In addition, in April 2020, a special unemployment insurance was established for six months to protect suspended or partially unemployed workers. This benefit was considered optional and could be accumulated with the regular unemployment insurance benefit.Along the same lines, a new law in Chile authorized the use of unemployment insurance benefits if suspensions occurred during lockdown. The law established that in the event that a company was strongly affected by the crisis produced by the Covid-19 pandemic, the employer and the worker could sign a "temporary pact for the suspension of the work contract", always in agreement with the worker's union. This pact could only be signed during the first six months of the Covid-19 pandemic by workers who had paid Social Security contributions during the three months prior to the pact, and at least six months during the last twelve months. Although domestic workers were not legally entitled to unemployment insurance, this law authorized them to sign a "temporary work contract suspension pact" and allowed them to receive the special unemployment benefit. Subsequently, in September 2020, a new law incorporated domestic workers into the ordinary unemployment protection regime.