In Venezuela, adolescents find it necessary to work to help their families cover basic needs, in the face of the accelerated increase in inflation
Text: Adriana Nunez Rabascall
Between construction pieces, Jhonkleyver Chirinos spends his school vacations. At 16, he works eight hours a day in a hardware store run by one of his relatives.
“I work for my family, to help them, and not only for them, but for myself, for my personal purposes, since their salary is not enough and I have to find my way to work for myself,” Chirinos tells VOA .
In a few weeks she will go back to school, and although she will be in her last year of high school, she has no plans to go to university.
«It would be when I leave, see if I continue working here or if I look for a better job. At the age of 16, I already feel that I am an adult, although I am not », she says.
In another neighborhood of Caracas, Kleiber Peña, also 16 years old, improvises a barbershop in the middle of the street, a couple of blocks from his house.
“I have been working since I was 13 years old and I do it because I like to shave. I like to earn my own money.”
Although his parents have jobs, what he earns as a barber adds to the tight family budget. For each cut he earns 3 dollars, and in a couple of days he can collect more than the minimum monthly salary of the South American country.
“There are times that I collaborate in the house for food and anything else that is needed.”
Kleiber is also not sure he wants to go to college after high school.
In the last decade, this phenomenon has increased, according to the National Youth Survey, prepared by the Andrés Bello Catholic University. According to the study data, the number of young people who reached a university or technical level went from 30% in 2013 to 19% in 2021.
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«An adolescent already begins to bond with others, to relate to other people and, therefore, he can have that ease of starting to do favors for money, and in some way, he realizes that for what he needs and his family needs, it is better for him to go out to work and earn money than to go to his high school”, warns psychologist Rosa Pellegrino, a member of the Community Learning Centers (Cecodap)
Venezuelan law allows adolescents to work, starting at age 14, as long as there is a balance between recreation and education, in addition to parental supervision.
“Families do not have the economic and even emotional capacity to support themselves and lead a minimally healthy lifestyle. Both children and adolescents, even from quite early ages, have found it necessary to assume roles that do not correspond to them, “says Pellegrino.
The legal framework of Venezuela also contemplates instances such as the Councils for the Rights of Children and Adolescents, in charge of ensuring that there is no exploitation or other types of abuse against adolescents who work to help their relatives make ends meet.
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