Labor Informality and the Vote in Latin America: A Meta-analysis

Abstract

Conventional wisdom among scholars of Latin American politics holds that informal workers are less participatory and less left-leaning than formal workers. Relevant empirical findings, however, are mixed and in need of synthesis. This article provides that synthesis by conducting meta-analyses on the universe of previous quantitative studies of informality and the vote. It finds that informal workers are indeed less likely to vote than formal workers, but the effect of informality is small—just four to seven percentage points. It further finds that informal workers are more likely to vote for the left, not the right, but here the effect size is even smaller. Meta-regression analyses reveal that in countries where organized professional activity among informal workers is high, gaps in turnout between the two sectors are minimal. The article concludes that the conventional wisdom over-states the individual-level political consequences of labor informality in Latin America.

Emigration, Social Remittances and Fiscal Policy Preferences: Experimental Evidence From Mexico

“…Mexico is a fairly typical example of a low fiscal-capacity democracy. Approximately 65% of the active working population work in the informal economy (Baker et al, 2020). Mexico has the lowest tax-GDP ratio in the OECD and one of the lowest in Latin America, collecting 17.9% of tax revenue as a share of GDP in 2020 (OECD, 2022).…”

Political Attitudes and Participation among Young Arab Workers: A Comparison of Formal and Informal Workers in Five Arab Countries

“…The authors argue that those results could be different in other regions, which this article will confirm in the Arab region. Another study by Baker and Dorr (2022) has conducted a meta-analysis, showing that results of the previous quantitative studies, on the impact of informality on voting in Latin America, are mixed and there is a need to do a summary of the overall finding. The authors argue that the impact of informality on voting turnout is negative, but the magnitude of the effect is small.…”

Trabajos empíricamente formales sobre la informalidad

“…En efecto, la recesión económica de 2019 y 2020, asociada a la pandemia, evidenció parte de los problemas estructurales de los mercados de trabajo, no solo en Colombia sino también en muchos países de América Latina. De tal suerte, la recesión económica posterior a la pandemia evidenció que los shocks de oferta laboral y de productividad son esenciales para explicar la pérdida de empleo y de producción y la disminución de la tasa de informalidad (Baker et al, 2020).…”