Wednesday, January 22, 2014

You’d be surprised at how poor the new ‘middle class’ is in the developing world

File photo of workers at a factory in Shenzhen, China, owned by Taiwan company Foxconn [AFP]
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The International Labour Organisation has identified a rapid growth of ‘the developing middle class’ – a group earning between $4 and $13 a day
When a million people swarmed on to the streets of Brazil last June there was consensus that the protest was a phenomenon of the “new middle class” – squeezed by corruption and failing infrastructure. As the Thai protests continue, these too are labelled middle class: office workers staging flashmobs in their neat, pressed shirts.

ILO:::GLOBAL EMPLOYMENT TRENDS 2014