Jared Laureles and Jessica Xantomila
La Jornada Newspaper
Sunday, December 8, 2024, p. 7
Two years after the reform of the Social Security Law (LSS) that makes registration mandatory, the number of domestic workers registered in the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS) is still tiny, since of the estimated 2.4 million dedicated to this work, only 2.6 percent have been affiliated, according to data from the organization.
Since the pilot program began in April 2019, this percentage has fluctuated between 1.8 and 2.6, even after the constitutional modification that came into effect in November 2022, due to employers refusing to pay worker-employer fees. respective.
It is a beautiful legislation, but a dead letter because it has no teeth
to sanction employers who fail to register people who engage in such work, said Norma Palacios, general secretary of the National Union of Domestic Workers.
In an interview, she accused that domestic workers also do not have effective complaint mechanisms and If they dare to speak out or demand this right from their employers, they are fired.
and they remain totally unprotected
.
For this sector of workers, it has been unattainable
enjoy the five insurances provided by the LSS, such as sickness and maternity; work risks, disability and life insurance, and unemployment in old age and old age. This is because while the law does not stipulate what happens if it is not complied with, employers they just don’t recognize
the obligation, he stressed.
At the end of November, the number of domestic workers registered with the IMSS amounted to just 62,645. The institute’s data also reflects a wage gap, because while men had an average daily income of 420 pesos, women earned 348 pesos. , despite the fact that they are the ones who are mostly employed in this activity.
The entities with the largest number of affiliated people are Mexico City, with 11,113 people, and the state of Mexico, with 6,793. By age range, people between 55 and 60 years old are those who have the most insurance social, adding 11,295, followed by those between 60 and 65 years old, with 9,275.
Another of the obstacles that domestic workers face is that employers insist on refusing to sign a contract, in addition to failing to comply with fair working hours, decent wages, access to study and the right to health, therefore that it is the workers who must pay for medical care, Palacios mentioned.
He considered that this problem persists due to the lack of dissemination of campaigns by the IMSS and the Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare (STPS) to make their rights known, since have been insufficient and without national scope
.
