Self-employed graduates are a record

Among the job offers for low-paying formal work and gigs as a beautician, social worker Aline Morais, 32, ended up with the second option.

Having attended college before the pandemic, she ended up dropping out of the training area. “The salaries they offered were lower than when I was an internship. Going to college was always a dream, but I ended up keeping my diploma in the drawer.”

The impact of the pandemic on the job market has led a record number of Brazilians with at least a higher education to join self-employment, whether doing odd jobs or becoming entrepreneurs. In the third quarter of 2021, the group reached 4.03 million, the highest for the period from July to September in a historical series since 2015.

The number of self-employed graduates who may be in a more precarious situation, those without CNPJ, reached 2.1 million, an increase of 14.1%, when comparing the third quarter of 2021 with the same period in 2019 — before the pandemic.

Among those with CNPJ, which also include Brazilians who are undertaking, this increase was even greater in the period, 37.2%, reaching 1.93 million. The data were compiled by researcher Janaína Feijó, from Ibre/FGV (Brazilian Institute of Economics, from Fundação Getulio Vargas).

The statistics, taken from the Continuous Pnad (National Household Sample Survey), are records for the quarter since 2015, when the survey began to monitor the level of qualification of workers.

The pandemic led in two years to an increase of 259 thousand workers in the group of self-employed without registration, who went to work odd jobs to re-enter the market, says Feijó. “In this universe, there is the engineer who became an app driver or the store clerk who became a food delivery.”

“The pandemic made workers with less qualifications suffer even more, but the data show that even those with higher education were forced to make sudden career moves”, says the researcher.

The percentage of self-employed workers with higher education has also increased since the beginning of the pandemic. Until the third quarter of 2019, those who were part-time were 9.5% of the total unregistered self-employed, while those with a CNPJ accounted for 28.6% of those with formal registration. In 2021, they corresponded to 11% and 30.9%, respectively.

Feijó points out that the greater growth among graduates who have CNPJ, which the pandemic led to entrepreneurship, may point to some signs of how the job market should be in the coming years.

While those without CNPJ, who are doing odd jobs, are a reflection of the low formalization of the job market, the increase in entrepreneurs may indicate signs of dynamism in the post-pandemic period, he says.

“Whoever manages to have a CNPJ is usually the one who took the little capital he had to open a business, identified a repressed demand for a product or service and wants to stay longer in this activity.”

A graduate in management processes, Kellen Apuque, 32, is an example of this second group. She decided to bet all her chips on work on her own during the pandemic. The resident of Belo Horizonte (MG) is a MEI (individual microentrepreneur) — that is, she has a CNPJ.

In 2020, Kellen decided the time had come to focus his efforts on consulting for companies on diversity in the area of ​​recruitment and selection. Before the health crisis, Kellen had a formal job, although he already provided services independently.

According to her, the concern of companies with diversity grew during the pandemic, which made the professional dedicate herself to her own business. Kellen provides services to companies online.

“It was not for lack of opportunity that I decided to work on my own. There is a need for a more humanized human resources area in companies. My proposal is to work for inclusion and diversity in the market”, he says.

Researcher Bruno Ottoni, from the IDados consultancy, assesses that, after the fall generated by the pandemic, economic activity had an insufficient reaction to absorb, in quality jobs, all the workforce looking for opportunities in Brazil.

Thus, self-employment tends to be more sought after, with or without CNPJ, and even by more educated professionals, says Ottoni.

“Jobs with a formal contract have costs for the employer. In a scenario of high uncertainty in the economy, as is the current case, the employer is usually discouraged from hiring with a contract”, he says.

According to the researcher, the so-called pejotization may also have accelerated self-employment in the pandemic – in this case, with CNPJ. The phenomenon tends to reduce costs for companies when hiring the services of a professional with formal registration.

“The high degree of uncertainty in the pandemic may have accelerated the pejotization process”, says Ottoni.

Economist Fábio Pesavento, a professor at ESPM (Escola Superior de Propaganda e Marketing) in Porto Alegre, agrees. “The costs for companies are lower”, he points out.

In Pesavento’s view, having a CNPJ also makes life easier for professionals who wish to undertake. To a large extent, this may be the case for MEIs.

On the other hand, self-employment without a CNPJ is more associated with the popular odd jobs, says the professor. That is, activities that are carried out by professionals who do not find other opportunities in the market and who urgently need some source of income. “The person has to survive, pay the bills. The pandemic inflated this”, says Pesavento.

LABOR WITHOUT A BOSS MUST KEEP GROWING IN 2022

According to economists, self-employment tends to continue at high levels in 2022. The projection is related to the perspective of low economic performance this year.

The scenario of electoral uncertainties, persistent inflation and higher interest rates, forecast for the coming months, makes it difficult to absorb all the unemployed labor. In the quarter ended in November 2021, the most recent period with available data, Brazil had 12.4 million unemployed.

“The projection is that the job market will go sideways this year. With that, self-employment tends to continue expressive”, analyzes Ottoni.

In the opinion of Clemente Ganz Lúcio, a social scientist at Dieese (Inter-Union Department of Statistics and Socioeconomic Studies), the denialist response of the current government during the pandemic delayed economic recovery and the reopening of better quality jobs.

“What we see now is an economy that is on the sidelines and cannot come out of the crisis with a virtuous response. fits in this government.”

Ganz Lúcio adds that the project for the country from 2023 must be radically different from this one and create a virtuous dynamic of growth. “It will be necessary to wait another three or four years to have a solid response from the labor market, with coordination of the public and private sectors.”