Page 60 - Azerbaijan State University of Economics

THE JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC SCIENCES: THEORY AND PRACTICE, V.81, # 2, 2024, pp. 60-83

TOWARDS REGULATING FREELANCE WORK AND THE
INFORMAL ECONOMY IN ALGERIA: WILL THE SELF-

EMPLOYED CONTRACTOR LAW SUFFICE?

Abderrahmane Benouaret
Department of Management Sciences, Badji Mokhtar - Annaba University, Algeria

https://doi.org/10.30546/jestp.2024.81.02.03

Received: August 15; accepted November 08, 2024; published online December 25, 2024

ABSTRACT
In order to regulate the freelance and self-employed labor market and mitigate the
impact of the informal economy, the Algerian authorities enacted a law aimed at
organizing new economic activities that emerged with the rise of the knowledge and
digital economies. This law became known as the Basic Law of the Self-Employed
contractor. This study aimed to clarify the extent to which freelance and self-
employment contribute to increasing the indicators of the informal economy in
Algeria. It also examined the role of the self-employed contractor law as a newly
established mechanism in attracting the largest possible number of self-employed
workers to the formal economy. Through an analysis of the data related to the subject
variables, the study reached a number of conclusions, the most important of which is
that there is a strong positive correlation between informal economy indicators in
Algeria and self-employment rates. Additionally, the establishment of the self-
employed contractor status is considered an important step in incorporating Algerian
freelancers and self-employed individuals into the formal sector. However, for this
law to be an effective solution to regulate the freelance and self-employment market
in Algeria, certain critical points that the study highlighted must be reconsidered,
particularly the issue of excluding certain activities from the law, such as liberal
professions and traditional crafts, as well as the issue of prohibiting dual employment
in the fundamental laws of various sectors.

Keywords: Self-Employed contractor Law; Freelance Work; Informal Economy;
Self-Employment.

JEL classification code : O17, J21, J32.

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