For a gradual implementation of the job guarantee

Impact on nominal GDP

Given that the average time spent by Senegalese on “productive” activities, as defined by the System of National Accounts (SNA), is 4 hours (ANSD 2022e), a JG program will have a significant impact on nominal GDP. It will increase the number of hours worked in the economy in a non-negligible way. In this way, taking into account possible multiplier effects, the program can be said to “pay for itself”.

Even for countries with limited monetary sovereignty, finding financial means is not complicated when there is the “political will”, especially in the face of recurring reports of superfluous public spending, waste of public resources and corruption. A policy of rational management and allocation of public resources is therefore necessary and possible. However, it can only be fully effective within an institutional framework of monetary sovereignty that allows for an optimal coordination between the central bank and the government. In the case of Senegal, this implies a reform of the exchange rate regime and, certainly, the adoption of an independent national currency.

From this perspective, one can think of the following financing scheme for a JG program. In phase II: 1% of GDP covered through taxes and grants. In phase III: 1% of GDP covered by taxes and donations; a variable part financed through deficit spending. As the unions suggested, it will be important to promote broad-based consultations in Senegal on a JG program. This will be a good opportunity to study how to institutionalize this public policy instrument once and for all, with a view to protecting it from electoral contingencies, political rivalries or attempts at regional or ethnic manipulations.

Conclusion

In the realm of (economic) policy, it is always premature and risky to say that there is no alternative to this or that. However, it is safe to say that African governments concerned with promoting full and decent employment have no alternative to a JG program. Indeed, the jobs that economic growth generates, regardless of their quality, are not enough now and, even under the best of assumptions, will not be enough in the decades to come. This is a fact that African governments, their economists, and their development partners need to be transparent about to the general public.

Therefore, it may be time for a JG to be part of the policy mix, especially in the context of the need to move towards an ecological transition and to reduce class, gender, racial and spatial inequalities. At its core, the JG is an instrument to serve the goals of full employment and price stability. However, its benefits are not only macroeconomic, but also extend to other areas. First, providing decent employment opportunities to unemployed or underemployed workers is probably one of the most effective ways to eradicate income poverty and to address some of the consequences that it typically induces at the psychosocial (deterioration of physical and mental health, loss of selfesteem depression, suicide, etc.), social (crime, prostitution, begging, isolation and loss of community ties, etc.) and political (vulnerability to various forms of fanaticism) levels.

Second, the transition from chronic underemployment of the labor force to a situation of full and decent employment leads to an increase in the activity income of the most vulnerable workers, who generally devote most of their expenses to local goods and services. This creates new opportunities for domestic enterprises. Even if this is not its main objective, a JG program can thus mitigate at the margin the demand constraint, one of the major obstacles to the development of integrated job-providing SMEs in the periphery.

Third, a JG program cannot fail to generate “institutional multipliers”. That is, its implementation goes hand in hand with institutional and regulatory innovations in related areas. A few examples help to illustrate this point. The administrative and financial monitoring of the JG pool will require comprehensive, reliable and up-to-date civil status files. This is a challenge in many African countries (Economic Commission for Africa 2017). Similarly, payment of wage income to guaranteed job holders can facilitate financial inclusion of populations, another common challenge in many African countries (Asuming et al 2019). Furthermore, observing the evolution of the workforce mobilized by a guaranteed job provides a good measure of the temperature of the economy and its cyclical changes. This type of information makes it possible to set up tailor-made policies.

Finally, the JG can be considered a “constitutional project”. Most constitutions affirm the right of every citizen to a job that allows him or her to live in dignity. This is the case of the Senegalese constitution, which lists “the right to work” as one of the “freedoms and rights” (Article 8) and specifies that “everyone has the right to work and the right to claim a job” (Article 25). However, this right remains essentially theoretical in the absence of a JG, which logically should be its institutional foundation. The fact of raising the issue of how to implement the right to decent work recognized to each citizen as such opens a horizon of struggles and democratic debates on the institutional modalities of its implementation and certainly also on related aspects such as the content of the notion of citizenship, the definition of political priorities, etc. Between on the one hand proclaiming the desirability of a public policy and on the other hand adopting and implementing it successfully, there is a significant distance to travel. The aim of this paper has been to convince that African countries need this instrument as much as others and at the same time should try to adapt it taking into account the specificities of their context.