On the Filipino Semi-Proletariat and the ‘Informal Sector’

Based on the conservative figure of 13.36 million (where we add 9.16 million self-employed plus 4.2 million unpaid family workers), of which nearly 60% is non-agricultural, we can estimate the size of the urban semi-proletariat or USP (including unpaid family labor) in the Philippines at a minimum of 8 million people as of 2008. The balance of over 5 million agricultural or rural semi-proletariat will logically blend into the rest of the peasantry—which could run into 50 to 60 million people around the same year.