According to the classification of the World Health Organization, any person, who works more than one hour a week, is considered as employed. In some of the countries of the world, the proportion of self-employed people to total employment is quite high, particularly in agriculture. For instance, according to OECD survey, in Columbia, half of the employed people are self-employed.
One of the highest rates of self-employment in Europe is in Greece and it exceeds 34%. In so-called Scandinavian countries, this rate is below 10%.
According to GeoStat, in Georgia, the majority of employed people are self-employed. In 2017, the proportion of self-employed to total employment was 51.7%, which id 1.5% lower than in previous years.
The proportion of self-employed people to total employment in the world is following:
Georgia – 51.7%
Columbia – 51.3%
Greece – 34.1%
Brazil – 32.9%
Turkey – 32.4%
South Korea – 25.5%
Italy – 23.9%
Spain – 16.9%
United Kingdom – 15.4%
France – 11.8%
Japan – 10.6%
Germany – 10.4%
Canada – 8.6%
Russia – 7.5%
USA – 6.4%