The measurement of unemployment in Mexico: a critique of sources

Abstract

The first part of this paper is oriented to make some reflections on the definition, interpretation and use of unemployment rates, as well as to make known the complementary rates offered by the National Institute of Geography, Statistics and Informatics (INEGI) regarding the Mexican labor market; in a second section, it deals with how this concept of unemployment is applied only in a context of labor markets, making explicit the factors that affect both its level and its variation and some data on unemployment in the country. The third section, central to this paper, refers to the measurement in Mexico of the social economic phenomenon of employment-unemployment based on the National Urban Employment Survey (ENEU), the most common errors listed by Morgestern in economic statistics and the identification of these errors in the ENEU process. This section proposes improvements to the survey in several of its parts. Finally, conclusions and recommendations for new indicators, better uses and greater dissemination are presented.