Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka

Informal employment remains a salient and persistent feature of the Sri Lanka labor market, with around 70 percent of the work force informally employed. There are generally three reasons to be concerned about high informality: poverty, productivit...

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Main Author:	World Bank
Format:	Report
Language:	English
Published:	World Bank, Washington, DC 2020
Subjects:	INFORMALITY INFORMAL SECTOR INFORMAL EMPLOYMENT LABOR MARKET POVERTY JOB QUALITY WORKING CONDITIONS VULNERABILITY
Online Access:	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/341681597688560604/Informality-Job-Quality-and-Welfare-in-Sri-Lanka http://hdl.handle.net/10986/34399

id	okr-10986-34399
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-343992021-06-14T09:56:51Z Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka World Bank INFORMALITY INFORMAL SECTOR INFORMAL EMPLOYMENT LABOR MARKET POVERTY JOB QUALITY WORKING CONDITIONS VULNERABILITY Informal employment remains a salient and persistent feature of the Sri Lanka labor market, with around 70 percent of the work force informally employed. There are generally three reasons to be concerned about high informality: poverty, productivity and public finance. This report focuses on the poverty and vulnerability aspect of informal employment, by showing that informal jobs are more precarious in nature than formal jobs and are associated with inferior working conditions and lower earnings. The three key messages of the report are as follows. First, The quality of informal jobs is much lower than that of formal jobs. Informal workers have more precarious employment arrangements and inferior working conditions. Their low earnings levels elevate the risk of poverty. Second, Stringent labor laws, along with the high cost of compliance and complexity of labor regulations, have encouraged informality. But formalization does not necessarily ease other constraints such as access to credit, reducing the incentive to formalize. Third, Reducing informality should not be in itself a policy goal. Reforms should focus on regulatory reforms that aim to reduce the cost and increase the benefits of formality, as well as on measures that enhance productivity. 2020-08-31T14:52:02Z 2020-08-31T14:52:02Z 2020-08-17 Report http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/341681597688560604/Informality-Job-Quality-and-Welfare-in-Sri-Lanka http://hdl.handle.net/10986/34399 English CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Economic & Sector Work Economic & Sector Work :: Other Poverty Study South Asia Sri Lanka
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	English
topic	INFORMALITY INFORMAL SECTOR INFORMAL EMPLOYMENT LABOR MARKET POVERTY JOB QUALITY WORKING CONDITIONS VULNERABILITY
spellingShingle	INFORMALITY INFORMAL SECTOR INFORMAL EMPLOYMENT LABOR MARKET POVERTY JOB QUALITY WORKING CONDITIONS VULNERABILITY World Bank Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka
geographic_facet	South Asia Sri Lanka
description	Informal employment remains a salient and persistent feature of the Sri Lanka labor market, with around 70 percent of the work force informally employed. There are generally three reasons to be concerned about high informality: poverty, productivity and public finance. This report focuses on the poverty and vulnerability aspect of informal employment, by showing that informal jobs are more precarious in nature than formal jobs and are associated with inferior working conditions and lower earnings. The three key messages of the report are as follows. First, The quality of informal jobs is much lower than that of formal jobs. Informal workers have more precarious employment arrangements and inferior working conditions. Their low earnings levels elevate the risk of poverty. Second, Stringent labor laws, along with the high cost of compliance and complexity of labor regulations, have encouraged informality. But formalization does not necessarily ease other constraints such as access to credit, reducing the incentive to formalize. Third, Reducing informality should not be in itself a policy goal. Reforms should focus on regulatory reforms that aim to reduce the cost and increase the benefits of formality, as well as on measures that enhance productivity.
format	Report
author	World Bank
author_facet	World Bank
author_sort	World Bank
title	Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka
title_short	Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka
title_full	Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka
title_fullStr	Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka
title_full_unstemmed	Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka
title_sort	informality, job quality, and welfare in sri lanka
publisher	World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate	2020
url	http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/341681597688560604/Informality-Job-Quality-and-Welfare-in-Sri-Lanka http://hdl.handle.net/10986/34399
_version_	1764480819216252928

Informality, Job Quality, and Welfare in Sri Lanka

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