Mapping The World’s Informal Workforce

The following chart uses data from the International Labour Organization to show the share of informal employment in different countries around the world. According to the ILO, informal employment refers to all "economic activities, excluding illicit activities, by workers and economic units that are, in law or in practice, not covered or insufficiently covered by formal arrangements". This means informal workers are not covered by national labor legislation, income tax or social protection. The Covid-19 pandemic exposed the vulnerability of such workers.

As shown below, informal employment is most prevalent in the Global South, with several countries in the West and Central African regions recording over 90 percent of employment as informal. Much of South and Southeast Asia also have a relatively high share of informal workers, hitting averages of 75-89 percent.

According to the ILO’s 2023 report ‘Women and men in the informal economy’, informal employment is a greater source of employment for men (60 percent) than for women (55 percent) worldwide, which is partly due to the influence of major countries such as China and Russia, where men face “greater exposure to informality". In 56 percent of countries, however, especially in low and lower-middle income countries, women represent a higher share of people working in the informal sector.

Other global trends include the fact that people in rural areas are almost twice as likely to be in informal employment than people living in urban centers.