Chile

Publications

Situation and Priorities

Social protection situation
The result of the October 2020 referendum, where Chileans voted to draft a new Constitution, has shifted the political landscape for social protection (SP) reform. The defined contribution pension system, which provided inadequate benefits for workers in the formal economy and left workers in the informal economy (30% of the labour force) uncovered, could now move towards a mixed system with intra- and intergenerational solidarity elements.

The health system could also be under review: coverage is currently fragmented, split between public (85% of the population) and private (15%) with large inequality of access and quality between the two. Chile has strong data infrastructure to identify vulnerable households, with their social assistance covering 60% of vulnerable households. The 40% who do not qualify are still in a precarious position, as are migrant workers, whose numbers quadrupled from 2017 to 2019, which helped to bring the gaps in the SP system into focus.
COVID-19 and other crises
Social protection measures taken by the Government of Chile to respond to the crisis included:
  • Passing a Law to protect jobs (Ley de Protección al Empleo), in which the unemployment insurance fund continued to pay a portion of the wages of employees whose contracts were temporarily suspended due to COVID. This measure benefitted approx. 4.5 million people in the formal economy.
  • An emergency cash transfer was implemented (Ingreso Familiar de Emergencia), providing families in the informal economy who lost their incomes with up to six monthly payments of up to US$126 per family member (maximum of 4 persons). At least 2.6 million families benefited from this programme.
For a more complete list of social protection measures, please consult the ILO’s COVID-19 Monitor.
Government and social partner priorities
  • Reform the pension system and extend coverage.
  • Improve social health protection, by reforming the current system towards a complementary multi-pillar health insurance system.
  • Provide adequate social protection to agricultural workers and migrant workers, taking into account climate change effects which are increasing the precariousness of these workers.

Results

Over the course of 2016-2020, the ILO has supported the Government of Chile on pension reforms and social protection for migrant workers. Concrete institutional results include the endorsement of an ILO-developed actuarial tool for pension reform by the Ministry of Labour in 2016. For more details, please consult the results monitoring tool below.

ILO Experts

IMG
Guillermo Montt
Specialist, Social Protection