However, this is primarily because of the Mexican government’s US$4.83 billion in loans extended to small business and midcaps.  As with any economy, it is the smaller businesses that drive economic growth.

Things might not be as rosy as the Mexican government paints it to be.  For one, the economy’s improvement is also rooted in the improvement of the United States, a trade partner that buys more than three-fourths of the country’s export products.

Before everything else that happened, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development has a better outlook for Mexican employment.  The country’s unemployment outlook for 2008 was placed at 3.3%, a better rate that the organization’s average.

Blatant Discrimination

However, what is more alarming with the OECD data is that they found that the country has a glass ceiling when it comes to employing women.  Mexico, despite the improved employment rate, also had the most dismal employment statistics for women.  Only less than half of Mexican women who belong to the working age group are employed.  More than 90% of adult males, on the other hand, are employed.

Policy-wise, the government has been lax or passive with regard to fighting this proof of gender discrimination.

Informal Employment Is Prevalent

Informal employment is when an employee takes on a job that has low salaries and yet does not get a formal contract or any type of benefit.  It is estimated that more than half of the workforce in developing countries are informal workers.  Mexico is not an exception.

Even as the Mexican economy is showing signs of improvement, the underlying dynamics of having a prevalent informal employment system speaks volumes.  What’s more, informal employment abuse the rights of the already disadvantaged worker groups like women, older workers, younger workers and those who have no skills.

Brighter Future Ahead?

Hopefully, the Mexican government’s current thrust on small and medium sized businesses will help stem or reverse discrimination against women of working age.  If a capable female cannot find a job, she can easily get government funding to start her own business.  This would also help curb institutional discrimination against hiring members of the fairer sex.

Also, better governmental policies aimed at cracking down on informal employment, putting up more stringent measures and implementing higher punitive penalties for companies and industries with informal workers should help the country handle the high rates of informal employment.

Furthermore, the emergence of new and smaller ventures just might help with the informal employment situation.  With government funding requiring new businesses to be registered, they should be under closer scrutiny from the concerned agencies.

With the United States economy also in dire straits, more and more Mexicans are looking for jobs at home, rather than thinking about seeking greener pastures in America.  The Wall Street Journal reported in February 2009 that only a little more than 700,000 Mexicans was caught trying to sneak into the U.S. in 2009, a far cry from the 1.1 million figure just two years earlier.  Pew Research also reported that 8% of foreign-born Hispanics in the U.S. are jobless as of the last quarter of 2008, climbing from 5.1% just a year earlier.

As such, the Mexican government should be ready for an influx of workers coming home from the United States, or those that are staying put.  It should look for more initiatives that would duplicate or further its success in creating more than 100,000 jobs in less than two months.  Only then could it sustain or foster economic growth.

Once jobs are continuously created and more capital is infused in mid caps and small caps, the government should then look into creating new policies or enforcing existing ones that would promote gender equality in the workplace and eradicate informal employment.  Both measures will surely strengthen the Mexican economy further by ensuring that more people get the job they deserve, and that they are justly compensated for it.  These will increase the government’s tax base, which it could utilize for further growth and more capital.