Is the Egyptian economy creating good jobs? Job creation and economic vulnerability from 1998 to 2018

In terms of overall growth rates, the Egyptian economy has rebounded from the slowdown it experienced as a result of the global financial crisis, the 2011 revolution and the revolution’s aftermath. The question we explore in this paper is whether the recovery in growth rates has been accompanied by an improvement in the quantity, and especially the quality, of employment in Egypt. We examine how overall employment and job creation have evolved and then delve into the composition of employment in terms of sector, formality, industry structure, location in and out of establishments and establishment size. We also examine other aspects of job quality such as skill  requirements, regularity, access to paid leaves, health insurance, hours of work, and exposure to workplace hazards and injuries, and we relate these aspects to the type of work that people are engaged in. As a measure of subjective job quality, we examine workers’ satisfaction with various aspects of their jobs and how it changed over time. We also trace the evolution of underemployment in the economy in the form of involuntary part-time work and educational over-qualification.