Youth informal employment in Arab States exclusion and exit

International audience Informal employment is one of the critical issues surrounding labour market debate in the Arab region. The latest data shows that 85% of youth and 61% of adult workers are in informal employment in Arab states (ILO, 2020). The aim of this study is to elaborate the profiles of workers who choose informality and those who are excluded from formal employment and modern labour market. Using the SAHWA survey and discrete choice models, this article confirms the heterogeneity of the informal labour market in five Arab countries; namely, Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Morocco, and Tunisia. Furthermore, this article highlights the profiles of workers who are more likely to voluntarily choose informality. Considering those profiles, this article will finally propose policy recommendations in order to extend social security to all informal workers, and thus achieve one of the Sustainable Development Goals on decent work (SDG8).