 All right. Hello, everyone. I'm Shakiba. I'm the course TA for the course we are we're engaging with at the moment. Decent work and economic growth achieving SDGA. So welcome to this or first the live Q&A session. I hope we're all excited to get started. We have with us today my teacher and Mike Rogan two of the lecturers on the course, both talking about informal work both with videos uploaded lecture videos uploaded on informal work and today they've joined us to talk a bit more about their work but also to field your questions and to engage with you on, you know, whatever you find interested from the course and questions that you might have as well. So, just a couple of things before we get started. I'll start by asking mighty and Mike to introduce themselves and and say a bit more about their work but before we get to that. Just want to say, will will keep you muted just to reduce the chaos in the room. Also, if you do have questions to ask when we start fielding questions please please feel free to drop those questions in the chat will pick those questions from the chat. I might also ask you to unmute and ask your questions, if you want to do so, but feel free to start putting questions in the chat. Just now, if you already have questions. All right, so we'll get started. I'll ask mighty and Mike to just introduce themselves to us to say a bit more about themselves to say a bit more about their work. And in their introductions to just answer like to two questions for us, both of them are involved in research and policy with informal workers. So I'll ask them two questions. The first being, what about informal work or informal workers drew you to research or policy in this area. And the second question being, what are some of the changes that you've seen in either the research space or the policy space over the years that you've been working in this field. Shall we start with you Marty. Thank you so much Shakiba and thanks to all the students for being here it's wonderful to see so many names. I'm Marty Chen, and I was a co founder of the we go network, which is known for its work with informal workers it's expertise but also it's more action work. So I'm a co founder of organizations and networks of informal workers advocate for a better deal. I also have taught at Harvard University for over 35 years. And what drew me to the informal economy. It's like an origin story I grew up in India. 90% of the workforce is informal so I grew up with, you know, a laundry man, a milk man, a postman, all of these kinds of workers a gardener a cook. I was a maid colon I who worked with us. And so I grew up with the informal economy and the first half of my career. I was working in South Asia I worked in Bangladesh for the 70s with this large NGO Brack, in charge of its women's program. I worked with Oxfam America field rep in India in the 80s, and again worked with many nonprofits working with informal workers. And so what draw drew me into founding of we go was that I then came after India to Harvard University, and had this rude sort of welcome that I was at an Institute of all economists that most of them thought the informal economy was comprised of those who were non compliant who were non productive that it was a messy concept they had all these negatives. And yet I knew it was where most of the working poor were. So I felt we needed to change the narratives. And I'm happy to say that there I think there've been two big breakthroughs, in addition to the fact that we have 10 million workers in the network from 90 countries or more is that the understanding of the informal economy has shifted early on it was seen as small micro firms with plucky entrepreneurs, and the informal wage workers and the contracted workers were not part of the definition. And that has changed. And then most recently with the COVID crisis. It was the first time in my more than 25 years with we go that I wasn't being called by journalists because the informal economy was seen to offer a cushion to those who lost their jobs mainly formal workers, but rather, it was recognized that the informal workers themselves were the disproportionately impacted by the COVID crisis. So I'll stop there and turn over to Mike Rogan. Hi everyone. Lovely to see you all and thanks for coming to today's session and being part of the MOOC. We've really enjoyed this and, and I hope you are as well. I'm based in South Africa, where I teach economics at Rhodes University in the Department of economics and economic history. And for almost 15 years, I've been a research associates in the urban policy program of we go, which which Marty has just spoken about. By training I'm a development economist with a particular interest in the labor, but I spent the first five years or so with my research career, looking at different ways of measuring things like income poverty and inequality and trying to sort of get to grips with some of the, the bigger picture trends around, around these two kind of key development indicators. But it became increasingly clear to me that if you want to understand what's going on with poverty and inequality you have to understand the employment situation and the source of earnings for the vast majority of the of the poor in the world. It was quite difficult, I think to understand the possible solutions to or ways to approach things like like poverty without understanding the informal economy. I also come from a country, South Africa, despite the accent, where we have something of a puzzle in relation to what we call the informal sector. We're one of the few if not the only countries in the world to have such a high level of open unemployment, alongside a relatively small informal sector by comparison with our neighboring countries, for example. And some of the things we've learned about the informal sector in South Africa, I think are important lessons for other places, namely that the informal sector is, is not a free entry sector or doesn't consist largely of entrepreneurs who can start up new jobs if they lose their jobs as, as Marty said, it's, it's not, it's not necessarily a cushion for when, when times are tough in the formal sector. So we've learned some things in South Africa about how the informal sector relates to its counterpart the formal sector and what those relationships might mean for the type of work that's possible in the, in the informal economy. Yeah, I mean thinking about some, some changes in the, in the research and policy space, just building a little bit on what Marty said, I think one of the most important and exciting things in the research space has been the way we're able to measure and understand the size and shape of the informal economy huge strides have been made. And a lot of those sort of improvements in our, in our collection and measurement of concepts in the informal economy have come from we go itself. And I'm not bragging because I wasn't involved with those Marty was really pushing the international conventions for measuring informal employment so we can understand properly what we're, we're talking about. And I think this is still on our minds, and, and in addition to the, the attention that was given to the informal economy. This was a moment where we really understood the potential and importance of social protection. And in particular in relation to the informal economy. We understand that 61% of workers in the world are informal. We are essentially saying 61% of workers globally don't have social protection. So when something like coven comes along. There's no safety net. And when that happens, we tend to be at risk of losing as it certainly seems we've done any of the progress we've made towards the things which we think are important like the sustainable development goals. So it's all about informality and informal employment. And the role of things like social protection has become increasingly important sense, and it was encouraging to see some, some steps forward in that direction. As a result of the COVID crisis and, and I think our hope is that those, those realizations and those gains can be taken forward and not forgotten. Thank you. Thank you, Mike. Thank you, Marty. Very interesting work that both of you are doing. I found particularly interesting like your module on informal work and COVID-19 and sort of the impacts on the informal sector. So for informational purposes for, for the learners, mighty teaches on module two of the course was just opened on Monday, and Mike teaches on module five so that will open in a few weeks. So module is about informal work and COVID-19 the impacts of COVID-19 on informal workers and sort of the lessons learned from that. And of course, Marty gives us an introduction to informal work in module two. So we do want to open the floor to questions. So do feel free to drop your questions in the chat and we'll pick those from the chat and also give you a chance to voice those questions as we see them. But while we wait for your questions, I have one question for you. Both of you, Mike and Marty, one of the things, one of the videos we see module two is Mike's interviews with the Bogata waste pickers. So the waste pickers in Columbia. And one of the, the asks or suggestions from the waste pickers at the end of that video is that there be some protection from competition for them until they are able to form themselves into a cooperative so that they'll be competition for maybe 10, 20 years until they're able to form themselves into a cooperative. But on the flip side of that, there is a strand of literature that talks about protection for infant industries and it's outright arguing against protection for infant industries. And so this suggestion by the waste picker sounds like protection for infant industries and I just wonder, sort of, what are your views. How do we reconcile those two things, asking for protection versus you know, literature that argues against protection for these types of industries. Mike, do you want to take that one first. Yeah, sure. I think you could look at this a couple of different ways. One is to think of groups of informal workers who are organizing themselves into properties as an infant industry. So not in competition with with infant industries. And probably, depending on the context and the value chain, probably being in competition with large international corporations, both those who are in the recycling value chains themselves, but also the large international corporations that actually make the products that are not being recycled as byproducts of their own goods. So think of tins, aluminium, plastics, things like that. I think those are the big companies, both the recyclers and the producers of recyclable waste from whom smaller companies and cooperatives that should be should be protected in terms of competition. So we need to see it necessarily as a zero sum game, right. It doesn't have to be either or. And I'm thinking of some creative solutions with producer responsibility type arrangements, where, for example, there are levies or contributions made by the producers of recyclable goods that can be handed down the value chain to sort of subsidize and contribute to the benefits of workers and organizations that are collecting and doing the recycling. I think, particularly in the waste sector, we have to remember that it's, it's just not not just an activity that supports households and, and allows people to earn a living, but it's not just an environmental contribution, it's work that has value in and of itself. So any creative approach we can take to involve those large companies, not as competitors, but allow them to, to sort of transfer some of the the gains and the value chain to the small companies and, and groups of workers that actually recycle the, the goods that they've, they've sort of created as byproducts of their, of their main products. So I think creativity and I'm thinking about it in a bit in a bit more nuanced way would probably be the best way to think about that. Thank you. Thank you, Mike. I just would add, as since I know the Bogota Columbia context quite well. And it applies to most other countries as well, which is that for generations, the recycling of waste has been done by informal waste pickers. But when cities sit up and decide to modernize, they extend the solid waste management contracts to big companies, often transport companies that have never handled waste, but then are paid by the ton to collect and haul and dispose of the waste without much attention to the recycling strand of waste management. And so what has happened is the waste pickers who were left out with this sort of modernization trend have had to advocate for many years in the case of Bogota, it was 20 years of advocacy to win the right to bid for a solid waste management contract. And the city had given quite a bit of money, it was $1.3 billion to some big companies who were not recycling, they were just hauling and dumping. And the Waste Picker Association had to move from advocacy mode to enterprise mode, they had to suddenly be able to make a technical bid with all that's involved in bidding. And then to be able to deliver efficiency on effectively, they had to develop an app for measurement. So what I think we need to think is that the model that's being talked about is the one that allows for more recycling in it, not just the collect haul and dispose. And the players are up against, like Mike said, really big players. There was a French international company competing in Colombia to buy up recycling, it's big money in the waste industry. And these groups have lobbied, advocated for 20 years to be part of the solid waste management. And now they're being crowded out after the moment of victory by fake cooperatives and associations of waste pickers. So I think partly because of the environmental benefit of the Waste Picker Associations being involved, and partly because of the very uneven power structure between the big companies and these small associations, that I think there is room to think about protection, if you want to call it that, or some kind of affirmative action in the bidding process for these groups. And we are also dealing with a complete mindset shift that was necessary for a city to recognize that the waste pickers were the original recyclers and the best recyclers. So I think for environmental and also for the power dynamics in the sector, it is important to give them that sort of window to be able to, to come up with an effective bid, and to be able to deliver on the bid. And that takes that takes some time. Thank you. Thank you both. And that context is is certainly what valuable. So we have a few questions popping up in the chat, I'll just take one of those one of those is is sort of two questions in one. And the question is, there seems to be a dichotomous view of formal versus informal sector. So from that the first question is should the informal sector be seen as a mirror of the formal sector, or just a sector in its own right. And following on from that, we're talking a bit about social protections what type of social protections, should we be talking about or thinking about for informal sector workers. So I'll give that to either of you who wants to take a go at that first. I'll take a go and I know Mike will have some important added value to add, but the formal versus informal is is complicated, because there are a lot of formal firms that hire workers informally. So there is informality in the formal right, but it's not a mirror image because the informal is comprised much more of self employment of the, what Gary fields would call the low end self employment with single person or family units. So it can't be seen as a mirror image of each other. And in fact, what we need is for labor economists and others to recognize that labor markets in emerging and developing countries particularly don't reflect the notion of a formal labor market with largely wage employment and unemployment. The point is that they also should not be seen as dichotomous, because they are linked. They're structurally linked in so many ways. Not all of informality but most of informality is structurally linked to the formal economy so they're producing goods and services that the formal firms the formal economy wants. They're often hired by or subcontracted by formal firms and platforms on informal terms, which means lack of any social protection contributions so what we're looking for in terms of social protection is a kind of universal social protection, but not premised on efficiency grounds but on equity grounds, and which is financed in a with progressive kind of financing not regressive. So some of the financing that's been proposed is quite can be quite regressive. Especially if they take out any as some of leading economist as proposed taking away subsidies for food and other things in in in the tax system. So, we are looking for universal, but we're looking for it with progressive financing, and as much as possible near equal benefits, most of the universal systems right now have lower benefits, even if you pay the highest premium for the informal workers, but over to Mike. Yeah, the, I think the only thing to add to the discussion of the formal informal dichotomy is that even the informal sector where we have self employment largely in particularly developing countries own account work which is where the self employed are their people they just work by themselves. There are lots of backwards and forward linkages between the formal sector and the, and the informal sector so it's very difficult to distinguish them or say that they are in some way separate. Many times the terms of engagement are dictated by the formal sector within the value chains in which they, they, they both competes and operate. And many times the possibilities in the informal sector determined largely by some of the bigger players in the, in the formal sector so it's very difficult, even with own account self employment to suggest that there's a separation between the formal and the informal. In addition to the points that that Marty made where there is lots of informality with within the formal sector. Yeah, in terms of social protection. We all know that this this discussion always also differs quite a bit by by context by the structure of employment and by the structure of the existing social protection system. Interestingly, in the mainstream economics literature there's been a concern that providing these types of universal social protections might actually encourage informality. So we've been involved with some research lately which really seems to question this and and and I think some of the evidence really points to the fact that social protection doesn't need to or is unlikely to encourage informality. Rather, it's, it's probably a very key and I think the covert pandemic really demonstrated this a key feature of promoting productivity and raising earnings in the informal economy. Right, it's the it's the gap or the lack of social protection, which is, which is the real problem. Certainly universal social protection is a huge part of the solution and in many, many, many contexts and and the problem that was exposed by covert is in many contexts including my own, we simply had no way of reaching those in the informal sector, the sort of social protection architecture that would be required for a universal program, whether it be health, whether it be income supports, whether it be for retirement savings would have allowed us to respond in that situation so much more quickly and and I hope was a wake up call in many contexts where informal workers are not a part of formal social protection. Thank you both. And just following on that social protection question there's there's a really interesting question here on whether there might be some room for private insurance solutions to plug some of the protection gaps for informal workers so that might involve informal workers paying affordable premiums and then having private insurance. Yep might go ahead. I mean, there have been lots of different models and hybrid models, sort of suggested. You know, I think the problem that we often have is the costs of private models are too high for for informal workers who are already forced in many contexts to decide how much food to buy and meet basic household needs literally the definition of working poverty to inability do to sort of contribute in some contexts it's it's certainly possible. One example that comes to mind is the national health insurance scheme and in Ghana, which I think is still held up as a, as a sort of flagship program for getting relatively high quality health insurance or health coverage to to informal workers, or those outside the formal labor markets in general. But the key thing about that is that the contributions are very very low right almost almost anyone can can opt in based on based on the contributions. One more promise is when the privates in public, or the private in particular can be used to cross subsidize the public. And I think in the literature the example that's held up the most is the is the mono tax in, in your way. And sort of use profits and proceeds in the in the private formal insurance sector to cross subsidize the public sector, but as Marty says, the key thing and the thing which which we hope people focus on is getting not just universal but high quality coverage to those outside or those unable to access these these sort of sort of private schemes but where where there have been examples of cross subsidization or or private public I think there's been a strong tax component to that, and which has meant that there's been really subsidized contributions from from those with very low earnings. Thank you Mike and my dear question for you. One of the things you talk about in your lectures is that the bad old deal for informal workers. And in one of the lectures you give street vendors in South Africa, as an example of that bad old deal sort of government, you know, removing their things from the street every now and then. So there's, there's a question here on what might be a sustainable solution for street vendors in particular in their relationship with government. And also some curiosity of whether we go has done any work on this particular issue in Nepal. Okay, yeah. Yes, well what the status quo in many cities vis a vis street vendors is a lose lose situation and I will give the example from South Africa, although Mike is the one from South Africa in Durban South Africa in sort of on the edge of the industrial business district between that and the transport node. There was a natural market of street vendors that emerged once apartheid was lifted. And it's, you know, let's say 7000 vendors. The lose lose was that every once in a while the city would sweep through at night and take the equipment and the pallets they use to store and sometimes even their stock whatever they left in the vending site and confiscated. And that cost the city a lot but it really cost the vendors now the vendors were mainly from townships which are at quite some distance and have no way to every day pack up their goods and their equipment and the sort of displays and take it home to the township and bring it back. So there's been a very innovative project in that setting for going on 20 years that has found solutions where you can rent a storage space near the market where the vendors can they even proposed you know all those parking lots for cars though they're completely empty at night right in downtown and Durban, but we we think our mindsets are people need parking lots because we don't think street vendors need storage spots. So, they've worked around it so it's more of a win win and the market is flourishing because there's a whole traditional set of products that are sold to the black African South African population in particular, that are delicacies and medicines or whatever that that population needs so that's the mindset shift which is that the street vendors are contributing their contributors to the city economy they sell goods and services at convenient locations at reasonable prices. In the case of Durban there's like 400,000 commuters that come in from the townships and go and work in the central business district and go back, and they buy the goods they need during the day maybe their lunch, and they buy things to take home to the townships. They have to be seen as contributing, and that there are the possibility of win win solutions, rather than these loose loose solutions. But there was a second part of the question which I've now forgotten but it's it's whether we go has done any work on on street vendors or in Nepal. I'm not familiar with our street vendor work in Nepal but I am very familiar with our work with another category of informal workers in Nepal, which is home based workers. These are people who produce goods and services from in and around their own home these are not domestic workers these are home based. And Nepal has been at the center of the regional movement in South Asia for home based workers and the first regional conference of home based workers was held in Kathmandu and 2000. The headquarters of home that South Asia the regional association of home based workers is headquartered in in Kathmandu. And I'm sure that street net international the Federation of street vendor organizations probably has a partner in Kathmandu I just don't happen to know it. It's hard to keep track. Thank you. Thank you, Marty. We have a couple of questions on formalization. So just want to feel those I see the hand up, I'll get to you in just a minute. So, the first question formalization is, is how can informal firms be assisted in the short run to be able to formalize in the long run and following on from that is in most developing countries with with high unemployment How should we assist or governments assist informal firms to formalize. Of course, both of those questions are on the premise that informal firms and workers should move into the formal sector. So feel free to to speak on that as well. Marty, you look like you're ready to go. I'll take you first and then I'm sorry, but I have taught a course on this at Harvard, which is the informal economy is formalization the answer question mark so very quickly formalization traditionally the mainstream mindset is two things. One is that you move people out of these informal activities into formal jobs. Right. But that's not happening. We have 475 million unemployed in the world. We have 2 billion informal workers, we need to get employment for the unemployed and help those who've created their own work in the informal economy to get on with it. So that that I mean it's good to create more formal jobs but it's just not happening on the scale. The second definition is that you register and tax the informal enterprises right the small firms. So there's, that has to be unpacked. One is that street, let's say a street vendor cities around the world, maybe once in 15 years decide to issue some licenses to street vendors, maybe to one fifth of the street vendors in that city. And then there's no way for a street vendor to register because they're not doing that. The second is there is an assumption they don't pay taxes but they do pay taxes and they want benefits for their taxes and Mike can explain the results of a recent study in in in Ghana. So what should formalization mean and we worked really hard with the ILO recommendation on formalization, which is that it should protect the livelihoods of the workers in the process, and it should mean several things. It should mean social protection. It should mean having a voice in policy dialogues. It should be having legal and rights, and it should mean economic opportunities the four pillars of decent work. It shouldn't just mean what it has meant, standardly, and then if those things begin to happen, the informal workers, well operators are would be more happy to register and pay even more taxes they all do already. But the whole debate leaves out those who are wage employed in formally, right. And there it's mainly formal firms and platforms that, right. So formalization should also turn the spotlight on the formal economy that contracts and hires workers informally. I'll leave it at that. Thank you mighty Mike anything from you in that. You know just to add to what Marty said there are lots of debates about what we mean by formalization. And, and many people tend to sort of focus as Marty says, on the punitive side, register for tax register with a local authority. But a lot of that sort of relies on the assumption which is, that's how we define informality. And as one example, we use the internationally comparable ILO definition to the survey, just under 3000 informal operators in in a craw. And we define this informal based on the labor force survey and the, and the ILO definition if they were a small unincorporated business activity so in other words they weren't registered as a, as a formal company. There's little evidence of any informal workers that weren't registered with some level of government, roughly 40% were registered for official tax with the with the revenue authority. And almost all of the rest were registered, either with the local authority for the types of permits and operating licenses that that Marty just mentioned. They weren't registered with numerous other sort of official or sort of regulatory bodies and, in fact, it was it was hard to see ways that they, they weren't registered, or on the books apart from registered as a, as a formal company with the, with the The other thing we pick up, not just in that study in a craw but in work research we've been doing for for many years if we go and with other organizations interested and researchers interested in these, these issues is that many informal workers and just think about self employed own account workers the thing that always pops to mind is the street vendor, like the example that Marty just gave. Interesting how often these types of workers are in favor of regulation. They're very livelihoods depend on well organized and regulated public spaces. It's the informal implementation and enforcement of these regulations which is, which is the real thing that bothers them. But from their perspective it's very difficult to see how they could be more regulated, or in other words comply more than they, they already are. It's, it's what they're getting in return which is, which is often the, the problem and that's particularly the case in, in terms of the, of the types of taxes which are often levied against informal workers they tend to be too high compared to what they would be paying if they were registered as formal, for example, employees in a formal firm, and they tend to be highly regressive, meaning the types of taxes that that we often ask informal workers to pay a higher share their earnings are paid by the lowest earners compared to the highest earners. So it's the type of punitive approaches that regulation often imposes, not that they're unregulated. And I think what one of the things we're often trying to say too is, well, what if we think about formalization as some of the benefits or the incentives that should come with it. What about people being able to write off payments made to indirect taxes, the way their formal competitors are able to do, or what about protections to work in their place of work, when they've paid these licenses and, and operating fees. It's not just to different types of social protection schemes, maybe contributory or, or maybe universal what about the, the sort of more beneficial aspects of formalization whereas the debate tends to focus on the negative, and tends to be built off on a myth that informal workers are largely evaders of such regulations when the reality that doesn't appear to be the case at all. Thank you. Thank you so much, Mike. So we said we would run this session for half an hour so far gone about 12 minutes over. I think we'll go for another three or four minutes, if that's okay with everyone, and that will allow us maybe two more questions. So just we have a hand up at the moment, I hope I pronounced that correctly if I didn't please correct me please feel free to unmute and go ahead, and then I'll take one more question from the chat and and we'll wrap it up. Please go ahead. Okay. Thank you. Yeah, you pronounced it correctly. My name is a guy from Ethiopia. Thank you all for having this opportunity and I'm one of your students who has registered for the course but unfortunately I couldn't attend the last couple of days because of my personal problem. I hope I will continue to attend the remaining classes. So actually I'm from the areas of economics. I have a PhD in economics and I have studied a lot of courses related with library economics and gender. So I'm a bit familiar with the issue that is raised here, but I like it more to advance my understanding of the issue and I was reading the notes given there so enjoy a lot. I have some questions here. First thing that's raised is the informal economy is always that the sector is characterized by no much protection and absence of job security and instability in the job, especially in countries like Ethiopia. There are a lot of no force engaged in the informal sector and much of the sector is dominated with such activities. My question is especially in terms of policies. What types of specific policy can be implemented for countries like Ethiopia when there is continuous unrest, conflict and weak government, especially in most developing countries. And again, there are a lot of influences from the international organizations. In the past, for example, the Ethiopia was removed from Agoa, which was a chance for developing countries. Again, millions of unemployed labor are also dominating the market, especially new graduates from different universities and colleges can't be employed in the context of Ethiopia. Now it is due to a lot of factors including the government's capacity and the level of our economy as a whole. So can we suggest a policy that can solve the employability of these new graduates from universities and colleges with their own years of experience, especially experience is one of the factors that affect new graduates. So policy is my question. So thank you. Thank you. I'll just give Marty and Micah a chance to respond to that quickly. And then we wrap up. Micah, over to you. Yeah, those are great questions and I must say Ethiopia is not a context in which I'm particularly familiar. And I think you're probably right that issues of conflict in particular sort of add an extra layer of difficulty. Although weak governance is probably a more common problem across developing countries with large levels of informal employment. Yeah, I think it probably depends quite a bit on the context and what exactly which sector of employment we're talking about in a conflict zone or country with weak governance. But there are probably some principles that would apply across different contexts with different challenges. And I think access to social protection, ensuring that infrastructure, particularly in public spaces, ensuring that there's the right to the city as our friends in urban policy and planning often say. And to think about your your urban spaces in particular about places that supports informal employment rather than try to sort of clean them up or brush them out the way. And, you know, I think a lot of cities around the world, whether they're conflict written or irrespective of their level of governance tend to buy into this idea of a world class city which you know I think ties directly to what with Marty mentioned earlier about the creation of lose lose scenarios they, they tend to be catering for this type of city that they envision rather than the city which reflects the needs and wants of the people who live and work in them across, you know, particularly across the global south. So, you know, without getting into specific examples I think there's some principles around access to public spaces investment in infrastructure in cities and access to social protection that any country could could focus on and then perhaps there would be some more specific issues around in Ethiopia that could that could be addressed but probably difficult to get into it at this particular stage. Yeah, and, you know, the idea of graduates unemployment and how and how to get graduate skills. Again, I think that depends on on the particular labor market in in question. In our neighboring country here in South Africa, Zimbabwe, that is a significant issue. Graduates from universities and technical vocational colleges, working in the, in the informal sector. But I think some of the same things would apply in those particular contexts, you know, those are the situations where there are a lack of formal jobs in particular. So the strategy would would still be twofold, how to create formal jobs that match the skills or match the skills that that are required by the economy. But also, it's not a substitute for supporting employment in the informal economy right as Marty mentioned earlier it's a two problem strategy. Think about how your skill system aligns with your with your private sector or your formal formal sector, but still the need to support in what tend to be quite large informal economies and countries like Zimbabwe and Ghana, whether or not the participants are from universities or vocational colleges I think is a slightly separate issue. But many of the things that we would do to support workers who created their own jobs and in the informal economy I think the policy advice would be similar. Yes, I would just add that, you know, in situations of conflict, or even of weak government, where there's, you know, quest, there's lack of investment in the private corporate sector. There are two broad kinds of policies towards the informal, and the one that comes to mind is the do no harm set, which is, you know, if there is conflict, people are going to take to the informal economy to try to earn a living to barter for things that they need with other people who are also suffering from the conflict. There's no context if there could be do no harm, don't evict, don't confiscate goods, don't impose bribes, whatever it is from the government side, because your citizens are trying to earn an honest living in a very difficult situation. And then you can think about the more do some good part of things, which would be the social protection, the use of public space, but you have to assume that the informal economy is going to especially in a conflict area remain a very sizable share of your economy and also of your workforce. So do no harm would be my closing mantra at this point. Thank you. Thank you so much, Marty. I was just going to ask, you know, unfortunately, we have to wrap it up here, but sort of as a final word, you know, one thing you want to learn is to take away from the course, specifically regarding to informal workers. Marty, for you, for you, that's, that's do no harm. I'll give you another, another chance, just drop a sentence to the learners. The one thing you want them to take away. And then we'll take you, Mike, and we'll wrap it up there. Well, just to say I can see from the names that we have. Many of the people here today, and I assume for the course as well are from developing or emerging economies and just to say the informal is so called normal in your economies. And the models that your finance ministers and your labor ministers as well will be of a different kind of labor market, where there is a lot of formal wage employment and unemployment, and the degree of self employment in your labor markets is really what you need to think about. And we need to change the mindsets that the informal are sort of negative a problem. They really are part of the solution because they're the base of the economy they're the base of the workforce. And we need this mindset mindset shift to embrace them rather than penalize them. Thank you, Marty. Over to you, Mike. Yeah, to I think probably quotes Marty Chen, I think a key takeaway message is the informal economy in many countries is the real economy. And as Marty says, we tend to look at it as some sort of residual or parts of the economy that we can't explain and when we look at it that way, we can only see it as something which needs to be removed or abolished or eradicated. And it's interesting how much policy advice leans in in that direction. But what we don't understand is that if we're serious about development, we're serious about reducing inequality, we need to support the informal economy. It's up 61% of total employment. It's, it's not something which is in the shadows, it is the, it is the main source of employment for the, for workers around the world, and particularly in the, in the countries where many of us on this on the And until we understand the labor markets with large informal economies are the norm, we're probably not going to see some of the more realistic and promising solutions that are right in front of us. Thank you. Thank you so much, Marty and Mike. And thank you to everybody who joined us for this session. I have to wrap it up here, but we've made a note of your questions and we'll talk some more about those on the discussion boards in the course. We have another live Q&A session that will happen in a few weeks in November, and that one will be on structural transformation where another two of our lecturers will join us for that session so look out for the details on that. But for now, thank you so much to everybody who joined. Thank you, Marty. Thank you, Mike. And we'll see everybody again soon.