Jobs, unemployment, and Obama

We have relatively limited access to the international news (we pretty much scan BBC headlines at the cyber and try to catch the evening TV news over our nieces' shrieking), so we don't actually know what is going on with Obama's jobs plan, but it is certainly getting a lot of attention here. People heard about the big speech and it is a popular topic for discussion around the tea circle.

First, people are intrigued by the idea that there is unemployment in the US, as most people here assume that if they could manage to get to America they would have it made. When I explained the nature of the problem, however, most of our friends were pretty shocked that anyone was so upset. Unemployment here, especially among young men in the age group we hang out with, is most likely well over 50% (though I don't think anyone is keeping statistics). People get by on "comissions," small errands they run for family members or neighbors and by sharing resources.  Partial employment of this nature, or working occasionally at a family business or restaurant, is definitely the norm. Even for people with steady jobs this employment is nearly always informal, involving providing a good or service under a tree on the side of the road (a good example is our friend Robert's hair cutting business). In many ways, the problem of young people leaving university to discover there are no jobs that utilize their training sounds very familiar to recent college graduates in the US, but the problem exists on a much larger scale. Given the expanse of the problem, someone asked me the other day if I thought Obama's "lutte contre le chomage" (fight against unemployment) would be intended to help only US citizens or might include Malians as well.

One interesting thing I have heard from discussing this issue with our friends is that government jobs are the most highly coveted positions in Mali. This is totally consistent with many of the ideas surrounding state control of resources in Africa that I've read about, but it is always interesting to see those readings confirmed through personal experience. Basically, the government has the best, most consistent hold over the most resources of any employer in Mali and if you can get into the fonction publique you will be fairly assured of a salary and a pension, as well as access to the many fringe benefits of power. As a result, many of our friends spend time studying for the "concours de la fonction publique" (civil service exams), that happen periodically. There is also a thriving industry in "trainings" to help people prepare for these exams. Unfortunately, as our friend Baissou explained it, the last concours had a little over 1000 job openings to fill and over 10000 people took the exam. Factor in the fact that a friend or family member already in government or a couple million CFA is known to be able to influence your employment prospects, and it is incredibly unlikely that your average law student will be coming up with a job. Corruption is generally not visible in everyday life in Bamako. Police officers on street corners let people go by without harassment, and one can typically pick something up at the post office without mysterious charges, but when it comes to getting access to government resources, people seem universally aware that the official channels do not lead to the best outcomes.

Another interesting note on the question of employment is of course that, while the vast majority of Malian women (including university graduates) would be counted among the unemployed, many work more in a day than any man I have thus far observed in Mali. Between cooking for 6 or 12 or 30 (and often a food selling business on the side), sweeping the courtyard and the house, hauling water to wash clothes, going to market to buy food, and taking care of kids there is enough work to keep all of the female members of the household busy all day every day. This is not to say that they take no breaks (Brazilain and Indian soap operas are very popular right now), but you will rarely (if ever) see a woman taking a 3-5 hour tea break with friends in the middle of the afternoon. There are lots of factors that contribute to this, but it always strikes me as interesting.