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Uruguay Blue-Collar Workers
Uruguay lacked a large industrial labor force by the
standards of the developed world. Indeed, urban employment
was
dominated by the service industries. Only 23 percent of
the total
labor force was employed in industry in 1988. Skilled
manual
workers nevertheless had tended to form unions quite
successfully
and hence maintained a relatively comfortable standard of
living,
at least until the military takeover in 1973. Since 1985
they
have fought to restore the former level of their wages in
real
terms, but statistics suggest that in 1990 these were
still lower
than in 1980.
Many workers made only the official minimum wage, which
fluctuated according to inflation, the exchange rate, and
government policy. In the 1980s, it was under the
equivalent of
US$100 per month. As of June 1990, it stood at US$76,
although it
must be remembered that the cost of living in Uruguay was
on the
whole much lower than in the United States. Overall, the
economic
position of urban blue-collar workers was far superior to,
and
much more stable than, that of workers in the informal
sector,
which was variously defined to include domestic service,
street
vending (particularly of contraband goods from Brazil),
homebased piecework, sewing, laundering, recycling, begging,
and even
prostitution and crime.
In 1964 Uruguay's labor unions came together to form a
single
federation known as the National Convention of Workers
(Convención Nacional de Trabajadores--CNT). In 1973 the
military
declared the CNT illegal; labor union activity virtually
ceased
during the following decade. In 1983, however, a new labor
federation, known as the Interunion Workers' Assembly (or
Plenum)
(Plenario Intersindical de Trabajadores--PIT), was formed.
The
PIT later changed its name to PIT-CNT to emphasize its
historical
links to the pre-1973 labor movement
(see Political Forces and Interest Groups
, ch. 4).
About 15 percent of the economically active population
was
employed as domestic servants, most of them women. In
terms of
status and income, their class position was between that
of bluecollar workers and the poor.
Data as of December 1990
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