Average statistics mask the severe budgetary constraints faced by households. The true success of a public policy is not measured by the volume of exports, but by the supply chain’s ability to respond to people’s immediate needs in the store.

In a tin-roofed warehouse in Caaguazú, Rosa wraps up her day using the same calculation she’s used for the past eleven years. She sewed forty-eight school uniforms, collected payment in cash, paid her assistant under the table, and stashed the leftover money in a cookie jar.

At the metalworking shop in San Lorenzo, a worker named Marcos has held the same position for eleven years. His salary covers the basic basket of goods, but it isn’t enough to pay for his seventeen-year-old son’s education or a mortgage. The company operates on tight margins because the total cost of each formal employee exceeds their take-home pay by more than half, so it avoids expanding its workforce.

Despite GDP growth and a decline in poverty to 16 percent, high levels of informal employment (62.5 percent) and low productivity prevent this economic boom from reaching household budgets. The concentrated agro-export model hinders improvements in real income for most households.

GDP growth is failing to trickle down to household economies. With 62.5% of the workforce in the informal sector and a high concentration of income, 40% of the population remains in a vulnerable situation.