Equality is seen as a guiding principle and strategic target for development (Barcena and Prado, 2016, p. 54) and as a fundamental condition not only for overcoming poverty and ensuring the effective enjoyment of rights for the whole population, but also for advancing towards social, economic and environmentally sustainable development. Their scantly diversified and highly heterogeneous production structures, within which low-productivity sectors account for approximately 50% of all jobs, are a key determinant of social inequality. The labour market is the essential link between that production structure and high levels of income inequality between households, which are associated with a highly differentiated distribution of the fruits of productivity and with highly stratified access to good-quality employment and social protection (ECLAC, 2010, 2012, 2014 and 2016c). This is largely because income makes a direct contribution to the well-being of people and their families and therefore shapes both their opportunities and the future of their children, particularly in societies where market mechanisms for accessing goods and services predominate.