Lesson 1: Overview of Employment Structures Worldwide
Video Lesson
Competencies
By the end of this lesson, you will be able to:
- Describe the major employment structures of the world.
- Explain the differences between the primary, secondary, tertiary, and quaternary sectors of economic activities.
Understand how employment structures reflect a country’s level of development and economic activities
Key Terms
- Developing Country
- Middle-Income
- Economic Activity
- Employment Structure
is a nation with a lower standard of living, limited industrialization, and a lower Human Development Index compared to developed countries.
Middle-income countries have economies between those of low-income and high-income nations.
Economic activity refers to the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services within an economy.
Employment structure describes the distribution of jobs across different sectors of an economy, such as agriculture, industry, and services.
Employment Structures in Developing Countries
Characteristics of Developing Countries (DVCs)
- The world’s least industrialized nations are heavily committed to agriculture.
- low level of literacy, high unemployment, rapid population growth
- exports are largely agricultural or raw materials.
- Capital equipment is scarce, production technologies are primitive, Productivity is low.
- More than 60% of the world’s population lives in these nations
They are divided into two groups
- Middle-Income Countries:
- Characteristics: Home to 75% of the world’s population and 62% of the world’s poor. These economies are divided into:
- Lower Middle-Income Economies: GNI per capita between 1,036 dollar and 4,045 dollar.
- Upper Middle-Income Economies: GNI per capita between 4,046 dollar and 12,535 dollar.
- Low-Income Countries:
- Characteristics: GNI per capita of 1,025 dollar or less. Examples include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and many sub-Saharan African nations.
3. Transition:
- Some developing countries, such as China and Thailand, have progressed to lower middle-income status due to high GDP growth rates.
- Others, like South Korea and Singapore, have moved into high-income status through significant economic development.
Main Types of Economic Activities
- Primary Sector:
- Definition: Involves extracting raw materials, rearing animals, and growing crops.
- Examples: Agriculture, mining, forestry, and fishing.
- Characteristics: Often involves manual labor and low-tech processes. Common in developing countries.
- Secondary Sector:
- Definition: Involves transforming raw materials into finished products through manufacturing.
- Examples: Factories, construction, and processing industries.
- Characteristics: Adds value to raw materials, generally found in both developing and developed countries.
- Tertiary Sector:
- Definition: Involves providing services rather than goods.
- Examples: Education, healthcare, tourism, and banking.
- Characteristics: Predominant in developed countries, includes a wide range of service-related jobs.
- Quaternary Sector:
- Definition: Based on knowledge and intellectual activities.
- Examples: Information and communication technology (ICT), research and development, and financial planning.
- Characteristics: Emerging sector focused on information and knowledge-based activities.
Dear Online Learner! The employment structure of a country indicates how its labor force is distributed among the primary, secondary, and tertiary sectors. Developed countries tend to have a larger proportion of their labor force in the tertiary sector, while developing countries often have more people working in the primary sector, especially agriculture.