Introduction: Model Performance or Precarious Employment?

Abstract

Sonia lives in a low-income neighborhood of Santiago called Pedro Aguirre Cerda. She and her husband, Germán, have one daughter. They live in an area where most of the people I interviewed complained that at least one member of their family was unemployed. Sonia had lost her previous job with a cleaning subcontractor two months prior to our interview when they realized that she was pregnant. She shrugged her shoulders and said: “They would have thrown me out anyway. It’s not as though I can take the baby to work with me. Also, the shifts were too long. We sometimes did three or four jobs in a day … plus the travel time. You can’t do that with a baby.”¹