- The informal jobs sector has cushioned the impact of an economic slowdown in Southeast Asia over the past five years.
- Malaysians are most concerned about their jobs and salary prospects as unemployment rises, particularly among the young.
- Positive export performance across the Asean-5 suggests overall job market improvement is close.
Street vendors selling food, clothes and trinkets. Rice field workers who are paid daily, with no job security. Nannies taking care of children whose blue-collar parents work in factories. These are the people without whom Southeast Asian economies would grind to a halt.
