Global Labour Markets – Regional patterns of the employment distribution by status in employment

Paid employment jobs (those jobs held by employees), particularly continuous and full time paid employment jobs, are known as the standard form of employment, marked by a subordinate and direct relationship between the employer and the employee and the fact that the remuneration is independent from the revenue of the corresponding economic unit. Nevertheless, despite being widely recognized as the norm in terms of status in employment, the most recent ILO estimates show that little more than half of the employed population around the world hold paid employment jobs (54 per cent of the global employed population were employees in 2017). Employers (those self-employed persons who engage staff on a regular basis), represented 3 per cent of the global workforce in 2017, whereas own-account workers (self-employed persons without engaging employees) and contributing family workers (self- employed persons working in an establishment operated by a relative of the same household) accounted for 32 and 10 per cent of the global workforce, respectively.

However, these global figures mask great disparities in the employment distribution by status category across regions. In fact, in Europe and Central Asia, the Arab States and the Americas, paid employment jobs are indeed the norm, representing respectively 82, 78 and 73 per cent of each region’s total employment in 2017. Conversely, in Asia and the Pacific and Africa, the share of employees in employment is much lower, as self-employment is the predominant form of employment. This is all the more striking for Africa, where own-account workers constitute the largest share of employment (44 per cent of employed persons in Africa were own-account workers in 2017) and employees represent less than a third of the African workforce. It is noteworthy that there is little variation across regions in the share of employers in total employment (see figure below).
The global workforce is unevenly distributed around the world in geographical terms: with over 58 per cent of global employment located in Asia and the Pacific in 2017, it is no surprise that the distribution of global employment by status in employment is similar to the distribution in Asia and the Pacific (see figure below).

Chosen excerpts by Job Market Monitor. Read the whole story at  Paid employment vs vulnerable employment: a brief study of employment patterns by status in employment