Seeking to dismantle a black economy dragging on economic growth, Mexico wants to lure informal workers into the social security net – and the reach of the tax man.

Six in 10 Mexican workers, or 30 million people, live in the informal economy, eroding Mexico’s already-low tax base and hindering plans to set up a universal social security system.

“The country loses 3 or 4 percentage points of GDP every year because 60 percent of its workers don’t generate any taxes and also don’t have social security benefits,” Labor Minister Alfonso Navarrete said on Tuesday.

“If there are no real incentives to make it attractive for informal workers to turn formal … it’s difficult to get this group to migrate.”

Navarrete said the new program would get government and employers working with Mexico’s powerful labor unions to bring workers into the formal fold and give them access to mortgage and lending programs set up for workers.

via Mexico aims to bring shadow economy into the light | Reuters.