More Than 6 Million Mexican Workers Survive on $5 US Dollars Per Day Patricia Munoz Rios - La Jornada
go to original August 9, 2013

In Mexico, 6.25 million workers survive on an average wage of 65 pesos (about USD$5) per day, and almost 11.7 million Mexicans earn up to 130 pesos (about USD$10).

Furthermore, 9.9 million workers earn salaries up to 190 pesos (USD$15). However, there are 3.5 million people that only receive gratuitous tips and lack fixed wages, indicates Report #109 from the Center for Multidisciplinary Analysis (MAC) in the Economic Research Institute at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. The analysis, composed by Professor Luis Lozano Arredondo and the specialists David Lozano, Irma Otero, Jaime Vázquez, David Moctezuma, Javier Lozano, Mario Antonio Quintana and Cristóbal Reyes, documents that in the past 30 years, the majority of workers have decreased consumption of tortillas, white bread, and milk due to insufficient pay.

More so, it is normal for many families to feed themselves with second or third-rate products; meanwhile, first-rate foods “are an untouchable dream for the majority,” the document indicates.

“In 1982 workers could buy, if desired, 51 kilos (over 112 pounds) of tortillas with a minimum wage. Today, they can only acquire 5 kilograms (11 pounds);" that is to say, the report indicates that Mexican workers are becoming poorer and poorer.

Read the rest at Mexico Voices

Translated by Julie Kawamura

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