Segmentación, fuerza de trabajo excedente y programas de empleo en el área metropolitana de Buenos Aires: un estudio a través de trayectorias socio-ocupacionales

the paper contributes to the understanding the social differentiation process occurred within the argentine urban working class, deepened by the structural adjustment policy implemented during the nineties. the research hypothesis considers if the differentiation among unemployed workers and the rest of the working class, could be considered socially relevant. this hypothesis is tested within a specific geographical context: the buenos aires metropolitan area, before and after the period of economic recovery and following the devaluation of the peso, at the beginning of year 2002. the methodology is the reconstruction and comparison of the socio-occupational workers′ stories. research results rest on secondary official sources and on a group of seventy in-depth interviews performed on males between eighteen and sixty years old, where it was able to differentiate a priori between two different groups: a) irregular workers that were recipient of employment programs, and b) regular workers, developing activities either in the manufacturer industry or in the construction sector.