Self-employment in Latin America by country 2023

Bolivia was the country with the highest share of self-employed workers in Latin America and the Caribbean, followed by Peru. In 2023, nearly 67 percent of Bolivians who were employed had a self-employment job (a job where the remuneration is directly dependent upon the profits derived from the goods and services produced).

Moreover, Suriname was the country with the highest share of employees in the total employed population in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Self-employed workers as share of total employed population in Latin America and the Caribbean in 2023, by country

Characteristic	Share of employed population
Bolivia	66.93%
Peru	52.6%
Ecuador	50.65%
Colombia	46.55%
Dominican Republic	42.37%
Paraguay	41.32%
Guatemala	39.54%
Panama	38.92%
Jamaica*	37.26%
El Salvador	36.34%
Honduras	36.08%
Belize**	35.21%
Guyana**	33.67%
Mexico	31.35%
Brazil	31.23%
Uruguay	29.25%
Costa Rica	28.01%
Argentina	25.75%
Trinidad and Tobago*	25.71%
Chile	24.65%
Barbados**	19.5%
Bahamas	16.51%

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Release date

2024

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Region

LAC

Survey time period

2023 or latest available data

Supplementary notes

*Data as of 2022.
**Data as of 2019.

According to the source, self-employed workers are those workers who, working on their own account or with one or a few partners or in cooperative, hold the type of jobs defined as a "self-employment jobs", which are commonly characterized as jobs where the remuneration is directly dependent upon the profits derived from the goods and services produced. Self-employed workers comprise four sub-categories: employers, own-account workers, members of producers' cooperatives, and contributing family workers.

The figures are calculated from the total employed population. Self-employment status does not include employees (workers who hold the type of jobs defined as “paid employment jobs”, where the incumbents hold employment contracts that give them a basic remuneration), workers not classifiable by status, unemployed or non-economically active population.

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