This is a picture from the Central de Abasto - a huge market near the Mexico City airport. It covers more than 750 acres, making it about eight times bigger than the Mall of America outside Minneapolis. We have had to drive through this on our way home from the airport, which makes for a long and confusing ride.
As the U.S. appears to be pulling out of recession, Mexico's economy is shrinking at its fastest pace since the Great Depression. The effects of the downturn are being felt across the nation, in all sectors of society and in most industries.
An herb vendor nearby says he started breaking up the thick bunches of parsley and cilantro into halves and quarters to make them more affordable. He says he never had to do that in the past.
And shoppers also say they're buying only the basics.
Lugging a canvas bag stuffed with vegetables, 67-year-old shopper Candelaria Gonzalez says she is no longer buying fish or beef.
"The price of beef has gone up to 80 pesos [$6] a kilo, and the minimum wage is only 50 pesos a day. Imagine," she says. "All you can get for the minimum wage is beans and tortillas."
The Mexican minimum wage is 55 pesos, or slightly more than $4 a day.
We've actually been told that Mexico has 2 minimum wages - one for manual labor or unskilled jobs and one for skilled jobs or those requiring a certain level of schooling. The manual labor minimum wage is $4 per day, the other one is possibly $300 per month. The number of hours worked is not a factor in the wage, leading many unskilled laborers to work 10-12 hour days and many skilled workers to put in less than 6 hours. The average Mexican makes about $10 per day. To put that in perspective, the average American makes about $100 per day.
In a country where nearly half the population already lived below the poverty line, the global economic downturn has slashed all of Mexico's largest sources of revenue. Oil profits are in a free fall. Automotive exports declined 40 percent this year. Swine flu and Mexico's warring drug cartels have battered tourism. And cash sent home from Mexicans working in the United States is dropping at an unprecedented pace.
Alejandro Villagomez is a professor of macroeconomics at the Tecnologico de Monterrey, one of the country's top private universities. He predicts that Mexico's economy will contract 7 to 8 percent in 2009.
40% of Mexicans live in Poverty, nearly 60% pay no taxes - normally bc they are "self-employed" "underemployed" or paid "under the table" The avg. annual salary for a family in Mexico is $4000 USD, the average in Mexico City is $12,000 USD - not bc there is less poverty, but bc there is more wealth.
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