placestats

Tuberculosis incidence vs. Vulnerable employment

Fades after adjusting for income

Across 176 countries, Tuberculosis incidence and Vulnerable employment rise and fall together at r = +0.52 (on a scale from −1 to +1, where 0 means no link). Comparing only countries with similar income (GDP per person) shrinks it to +0.18, which could easily be chance (q = 0.39, allowing for the many pairs tested, and allowing for countries in the same region being alike). So the first figure mostly shows richer countries differing from poorer ones, not a link between these two things. Caution: correlation moves sharply once outliers are trimmed.

Comparing countries across the middle half of tuberculosis incidence, 10 to 134 per 100,000 people, vulnerable employment is worse by 12.2% of employment at the top of that range than the bottom. Comparing only countries with similar national income, the gap is 2.55% of employment.

Link before adjusting (r)+0.517p = 2.0e-13 · 176 countries
After adjusting for national income+0.177p = 0.019 · likely range [+0.03, +0.32]
p, allowing for regions0.192standard error 0.120 · 7 regions
Check for luck (q)0.393across 12,497 pairs

How to read these.r runs from −1 (one goes up as the other goes down) to +1 (they rise together), and 0 means no link. Adjusting for national income means comparing countries with the same GDP per person, so differences in wealth can’t explain the link. Income is used in percentage terms, since an extra $1,000 means more to a poor country than to a rich one. p is how likely a link this strong would be if there were really none. Below 0.05 means it is unlikely to be chance. Very small values are written in short form: 1.1e-32 means a decimal point followed by 31 zeros and then 11, so very close to zero. The likely range is where the true figure probably lies, and a range that crosses zero means the link could easily be chance. Countries in the same region tend to resemble each other, so the third figure allows for that, which gives a fairer p. The standard error is the typical size of the error in r. Finally, testing this many pairs means some will look strong by luck alone. A q below 0.05 means this link is unlikely to be one of those.

Tuberculosis incidence · per 100,000 peoplelink with income -0.67 · high
Vulnerable employment · % of employmentlink with income -0.87 · proxy

Both of these rise and fall closely with national income, so a strong link between them before adjusting was close to certain. Read the adjusted figure, not the first one.

“Link with income” is how closely each measure tracks GDP per person across countries, from −1 to +1.

Every country as a dot

Tuberculosis incidence · per 100,000 people →Vulnerable employment · % of employment →0.296640.456%90.2%Afghanistan: 203 per 100,000 people, 81.8% of employmentAngola: 373 per 100,000 people, 66.3% of employmentAlbania: 15 per 100,000 people, 46% of employmentUnited Arab Emirates: 0.63 per 100,000 people, 1.5% of employmentArgentina: 44 per 100,000 people, 22.3% of employmentArmenia: 19 per 100,000 people, 32.8% of employmentAustralia: 6.9 per 100,000 people, 9.12% of employmentAustria: 4.9 per 100,000 people, 7.85% of employmentAzerbaijan: 64 per 100,000 people, 53.8% of employmentBurundi: 83 per 100,000 people, 83.7% of employmentBelgium: 2.7 per 100,000 people, 11% of employmentBenin: 40 per 100,000 people, 78.5% of employmentBurkina Faso: 57 per 100,000 people, 80.6% of employmentBangladesh: 221 per 100,000 people, 57.3% of employmentBulgaria: 12 per 100,000 people, 6.92% of employmentBahrain: 12 per 100,000 people, 0.749% of employmentBahamas, The: 18 per 100,000 people, 15.9% of employmentBosnia and Herzegovina: 21 per 100,000 people, 18.1% of employmentBelarus: 17 per 100,000 people, 6.33% of employmentBelize: 34 per 100,000 people, 29.8% of employmentBolivia: 114 per 100,000 people, 62.7% of employmentBrazil: 49 per 100,000 people, 26.1% of employmentBarbados: 1 per 100,000 people, 18.8% of employmentBrunei Darussalam: 65 per 100,000 people, 4.48% of employmentBhutan: 191 per 100,000 people, 69% of employmentBotswana: 143 per 100,000 people, 25.6% of employmentCentral African Republic: 419 per 100,000 people, 79.4% of employmentCanada: 6.2 per 100,000 people, 9.56% of employmentSwitzerland: 5.4 per 100,000 people, 9.6% of employmentChile: 19 per 100,000 people, 20.9% of employmentChina: 49 per 100,000 people, 33.4% of employmentCote d'Ivoire: 99 per 100,000 people, 69.4% of employmentCameroon: 132 per 100,000 people, 67.6% of employmentCongo, Dem. Rep.: 377 per 100,000 people, 81.5% of employmentCongo, Rep.: 302 per 100,000 people, 75.9% of employmentColombia: 49 per 100,000 people, 43% of employmentComoros: 22 per 100,000 people, 56.8% of employmentCabo Verde: 47 per 100,000 people, 34.3% of employmentCosta Rica: 9.3 per 100,000 people, 23.4% of employmentCyprus: 5.5 per 100,000 people, 8.38% of employmentCzechia: 4.9 per 100,000 people, 13.5% of employmentGermany: 5.4 per 100,000 people, 4.34% of employmentDjibouti: 495 per 100,000 people, 30.3% of employmentDenmark: 3.2 per 100,000 people, 5.4% of employmentDominican Republic: 51 per 100,000 people, 38% of employmentAlgeria: 54 per 100,000 people, 25.6% of employmentEcuador: 66 per 100,000 people, 50.1% of employmentEgypt, Arab Rep.: 10 per 100,000 people, 23.9% of employmentSpain: 7.9 per 100,000 people, 10.1% of employmentEstonia: 8.2 per 100,000 people, 7.09% of employmentEthiopia: 141 per 100,000 people, 84.1% of employmentFinland: 3.7 per 100,000 people, 9.46% of employmentFiji: 104 per 100,000 people, 32.8% of employmentFrance: 7.8 per 100,000 people, 8.5% of employmentGabon: 371 per 100,000 people, 29.8% of employmentUnited Kingdom: 9.7 per 100,000 people, 11.5% of employmentGeorgia: 45 per 100,000 people, 42.4% of employmentGhana: 126 per 100,000 people, 60% of employmentGuinea: 178 per 100,000 people, 79.2% of employmentGambia, The: 138 per 100,000 people, 63.5% of employmentGuinea-Bissau: 176 per 100,000 people, 74.9% of employmentEquatorial Guinea: 199 per 100,000 people, 23.1% of employmentGreece: 3.6 per 100,000 people, 23.1% of employmentGuatemala: 28 per 100,000 people, 36.2% of employmentGuyana: 67 per 100,000 people, 25.3% of employmentHong Kong SAR, China: 66 per 100,000 people, 5.76% of employmentHonduras: 38 per 100,000 people, 33.9% of employmentCroatia: 6.6 per 100,000 people, 6.35% of employmentHaiti: 175 per 100,000 people, 76% of employmentHungary: 5.6 per 100,000 people, 7.83% of employmentIndonesia: 382 per 100,000 people, 50% of employmentIndia: 187 per 100,000 people, 71.6% of employmentIreland: 6.2 per 100,000 people, 9.64% of employmentIran, Islamic Rep.: 10 per 100,000 people, 39.5% of employmentIraq: 21 per 100,000 people, 27.1% of employmentIceland: 3 per 100,000 people, 8.4% of employmentIsrael: 2.4 per 100,000 people, 7.7% of employmentItaly: 5 per 100,000 people, 14.3% of employmentJamaica: 2.3 per 100,000 people, 31.6% of employmentJordan: 3.5 per 100,000 people, 7.86% of employmentJapan: 9.8 per 100,000 people, 7.49% of employmentKazakhstan: 45 per 100,000 people, 24.8% of employmentKenya: 207 per 100,000 people, 63.8% of employmentKyrgyz Republic: 128 per 100,000 people, 29% of employmentCambodia: 272 per 100,000 people, 52.3% of employmentKorea, Rep.: 35 per 100,000 people, 17.7% of employmentKuwait: 10 per 100,000 people, 2.4% of employmentLao PDR: 127 per 100,000 people, 76.4% of employmentLebanon: 13 per 100,000 people, 19.4% of employmentLiberia: 207 per 100,000 people, 76.9% of employmentLibya: 63 per 100,000 people, 21.6% of employmentSt. Lucia: 0.56 per 100,000 people, 22% of employmentSri Lanka: 59 per 100,000 people, 39.2% of employmentLesotho: 548 per 100,000 people, 32.6% of employmentLithuania: 31 per 100,000 people, 10.4% of employmentLuxembourg: 7.5 per 100,000 people, 6.95% of employmentLatvia: 21 per 100,000 people, 8.62% of employmentMacao SAR, China: 59 per 100,000 people, 3.33% of employmentMorocco: 98 per 100,000 people, 35.5% of employmentMoldova: 64 per 100,000 people, 58.6% of employmentMadagascar: 224 per 100,000 people, 84.4% of employmentMaldives: 40 per 100,000 people, 16.9% of employmentMexico: 28 per 100,000 people, 25.3% of employmentNorth Macedonia: 11 per 100,000 people, 12.3% of employmentMali: 51 per 100,000 people, 75.8% of employmentMalta: 15 per 100,000 people, 10.1% of employmentMyanmar: 482 per 100,000 people, 62.9% of employmentMontenegro: 16 per 100,000 people, 14.3% of employmentMongolia: 446 per 100,000 people, 38.4% of employmentMozambique: 361 per 100,000 people, 83.7% of employmentMauritania: 65 per 100,000 people, 53.3% of employmentMauritius: 13 per 100,000 people, 14.9% of employmentMalawi: 113 per 100,000 people, 59.9% of employmentMalaysia: 96 per 100,000 people, 21.9% of employmentNamibia: 422 per 100,000 people, 29.9% of employmentNiger: 86 per 100,000 people, 83.7% of employmentNigeria: 219 per 100,000 people, 66.5% of employmentNicaragua: 43 per 100,000 people, 38.9% of employmentNetherlands: 4.7 per 100,000 people, 13.4% of employmentNorway: 3.3 per 100,000 people, 4.17% of employmentNepal: 227 per 100,000 people, 77% of employmentNew Zealand: 7.9 per 100,000 people, 12.6% of employmentOman: 11 per 100,000 people, 3.81% of employmentPakistan: 266 per 100,000 people, 55.5% of employmentPanama: 63 per 100,000 people, 37.9% of employmentPeru: 139 per 100,000 people, 47.5% of employmentPhilippines: 625 per 100,000 people, 33.6% of employmentPapua New Guinea: 664 per 100,000 people, 71.2% of employmentPoland: 11 per 100,000 people, 15% of employmentPuerto Rico (US): 0.55 per 100,000 people, 10.3% of employmentPortugal: 15 per 100,000 people, 9.66% of employmentParaguay: 81 per 100,000 people, 36.1% of employmentWest Bank and Gaza: 0.29 per 100,000 people, 18.4% of employmentQatar: 37 per 100,000 people, 0.456% of employmentRomania: 60 per 100,000 people, 13% of employmentRussian Federation: 34 per 100,000 people, 4.93% of employmentRwanda: 62 per 100,000 people, 39.4% of employmentSaudi Arabia: 8.4 per 100,000 people, 1.66% of employmentSudan: 47 per 100,000 people, 39.7% of employmentSenegal: 132 per 100,000 people, 63% of employmentSingapore: 43 per 100,000 people, 9.3% of employmentSolomon Islands: 123 per 100,000 people, 68.7% of employmentSierra Leone: 372 per 100,000 people, 86% of employmentEl Salvador: 116 per 100,000 people, 30.8% of employmentSomalia, Fed. Rep.: 151 per 100,000 people, 46% of employmentSerbia: 8.7 per 100,000 people, 23.9% of employmentSao Tome and Principe: 87 per 100,000 people, 35% of employmentSuriname: 34 per 100,000 people, 18.4% of employmentSlovak Republic: 3.3 per 100,000 people, 11.8% of employmentSlovenia: 2.6 per 100,000 people, 10.6% of employmentSweden: 3.3 per 100,000 people, 6.87% of employmentEswatini: 319 per 100,000 people, 28.4% of employmentSyrian Arab Republic: 23 per 100,000 people, 38.9% of employmentChad: 118 per 100,000 people, 90.2% of employmentTogo: 48 per 100,000 people, 75% of employmentThailand: 146 per 100,000 people, 48% of employmentTajikistan: 75 per 100,000 people, 28% of employmentTurkmenistan: 40 per 100,000 people, 28.3% of employmentTimor-Leste: 496 per 100,000 people, 58.6% of employmentTonga: 1.9 per 100,000 people, 33.7% of employmentTrinidad and Tobago: 27 per 100,000 people, 21.2% of employmentTunisia: 39 per 100,000 people, 17.9% of employmentTurkiye: 13 per 100,000 people, 23.9% of employmentTanzania: 172 per 100,000 people, 83.7% of employmentUganda: 197 per 100,000 people, 74.4% of employmentUkraine: 86 per 100,000 people, 19% of employmentUruguay: 47 per 100,000 people, 24.4% of employmentUnited States: 3.2 per 100,000 people, 3.81% of employmentUzbekistan: 51 per 100,000 people, 33.3% of employmentSt. Vincent and the Grenadines: 4.6 per 100,000 people, 22% of employmentViet Nam: 182 per 100,000 people, 51.4% of employmentVanuatu: 44 per 100,000 people, 58% of employmentSamoa: 5.5 per 100,000 people, 41.6% of employmentSouth Africa: 389 per 100,000 people, 11.7% of employmentZambia: 272 per 100,000 people, 70.2% of employmentZimbabwe: 203 per 100,000 people, 68.2% of employmentAREBDIBENBFABHRCAFDJILSOPHLPNGSAUSLE

best-fit line line after adjusting

Four ways to measure the link

MethodrpCountries
Standard (Pearson), not adjusted+0.5172.0e-13176
By rank (Spearman), not adjusted+0.7156.9e-29176
Standard (Pearson), adjusted for national income+0.1770.019176
By rank (Spearman), adjusted for national income+0.3695.2e-7176

The rank version uses only each country’s place in line, from lowest to highest, so a few extreme countries count for less. The adjusted and unadjusted versions use the same 176 countries: those that report both measures and GDP per person. So the gap between them comes from the adjustment, not from a change in which countries are counted. Drop in the size of r after adjusting: +0.341 (a minus sign means it grew).

How solid is it?

Leaving out one country at a time, r ranges from +0.155 (without PSE) to +0.232 (without LSO). The bar above shows that range on a scale from −1 to +1, with the solid line at the full result. The single country that moves r most: LSO (+0.055).

Fragile: this link may not hold up.
  • correlation moves sharply once outliers are trimmed
  • direction is not consistent across regions

Within each region

Countries are not separate, unrelated cases, and neighbors share a lot. A link that holds inside each region is far more believable than one that shows up only when comparing regions.

nr
East Asia & Pacific25+0.23
Europe & Central Asia48+0.17
Latin America & Caribbean28+0.75
Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan & Pakistan22+0.30
Sub-Saharan Africa45-0.09

By income third

If the link shows up only in the richest third of countries, it is a feature of rich countries, not a general pattern.

nr
Poorest third59+0.18
Middle third58+0.15
Richest third59+0.43

By largest religious group

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
Christians105+0.01
Muslims49+0.33

By last european coloniser

Countries grouped by a label they share, such as main religion, rather than by a number. Groups of fewer than twelve countries are not shown. These groups differ in income, region and history all at once. So a gap between them is a place to start asking questions, not an answer.

nr
France25-0.04
Never a European colony21+0.26
Spain19-0.07
United Kingdom55+0.27

Without outliers (countries far outside the middle half of countries on either measure, by more than one and a half times the width of that middle half): r = +0.519 after dropping 17 countries.

Two series, one country

Both measures over the years for one country you pick. The two charts are stacked so they share only the years along the bottom.

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Over time, within countries

Everything above compares countries with each other at one moment. This section compares each country only with itself over 25years. So a link here can’t come from anything about a country that stays the same, such as its history, geography, institutions or culture.

Within countries over time, there is no link that is clearly more than chance (r = +0.026, comparing each country only with itself over the years, and each year only with the same year elsewhere). Whatever the cross-country picture shows, countries whose tuberculosis incidence moved did not tend to see their vulnerable employment move with it.

Across countries (adjusted)+0.177for comparison
Within countries+0.225each country vs itself
…and vs the same year elsewhere+0.026q = 0.695 · 184 countries
Year-on-year changes+0.003q = 0.855
Read with care.
  • Almost all of the second indicator's variation is between countries, so the within-country estimate rests on a small part of the data.

4,568 country-years (one country in one year), 184 countries, 2000–2024, about 25 years each on average. Share of the variation that happens within countries over time: 17% for Tuberculosis incidence, 1% for Vulnerable employment. The margins of error allow for each country appearing many times, and for each year’s value being close to the year before.

Year-to-year changes are a cautious test, not a final answer. Looking only at changes from one year to the next removes each country’s own trends. But it also makes measurement mistakes louder, which pulls the results toward zero. A near-zero result here is weak evidence of no link, not proof.

With one measure years behind the other

0.10−0.1-100+10years Vulnerable employment trails Tuberculosis incidence →lag -10: r = -0.036 (n = 4,397)lag -9: r = -0.031 (n = 4,577)lag -8: r = -0.023 (n = 4,577)lag -7: r = -0.016 (n = 4,577)lag -6: r = -0.009 (n = 4,577)lag -5: r = -0.001 (n = 4,577)lag -4: r = 0.006 (n = 4,577)lag -3: r = 0.014 (n = 4,577)lag -2: r = 0.019 (n = 4,576)lag -1: r = 0.023 (n = 4,573)lag +0: r = 0.026 (n = 4,568)lag +1: r = 0.028 (n = 4,563)lag +2: r = 0.030 (n = 4,379)lag +3: r = 0.033 (n = 4,195)lag +4: r = 0.034 (n = 4,011)lag +5: r = 0.033 (n = 3,827)lag +6: r = 0.030 (n = 3,643)lag +7: r = 0.025 (n = 3,459)lag +8: r = 0.021 (n = 3,275)lag +9: r = 0.016 (n = 3,087)lag +10: r = 0.011 (n = 2,904)

Same year (lag 0): +0.026. A peak away from zero does not show which comes first. These series change slowly — this year’s value is close to last year’s. That makes the curve smooth and nearly symmetric, whatever produced the data. Even a sharp peak at one lag (a gap of some years) would not prove that one measure changes the other.

This curve peaks at the edge of the window (lag -10), so it is still drifting where the search stops. That pattern usually reflects a slow trend left over in the data, not a link with real timing. The peak value should not be read as the “true” link at the right lag.

The data


per 100,000 people
% of employment		Years
Papua New Guinea PNG66471.2%2024, 2025
Philippines PHL62533.6%2024, 2025
Lesotho LSO54832.6%2024, 2025
Timor-Leste TLS49658.6%2024, 2025
Djibouti DJI49530.3%2024, 2025
Myanmar MMR48262.9%2024, 2025
Mongolia MNG44638.4%2024, 2025
Namibia NAM42229.9%2024, 2025
Central African Republic CAF41979.4%2024, 2025
South Africa ZAF38911.7%2024, 2025
Indonesia IDN38250%2024, 2025
Congo, Dem. Rep. COD37781.5%2024, 2025
Angola AGO37366.3%2024, 2025
Sierra Leone SLE37286%2024, 2025
Gabon GAB37129.8%2024, 2025

World Bank, World Development Indicators
World Bank, World Development Indicators

Sources

Tuberculosis incidence

Incidence of tuberculosis (per 100,000 people)

World Health Organization · CC BY 4.0 · updated quarterly

Vulnerable employment

Vulnerable employment, total (% of total employment)

International Labour Organization · CC BY 4.0 · updated quarterly

Self-employed workers and unpaid family workers, who have no employer and usually no protection. The ILO estimates it with a model for every country and year, which is why it is complete where surveys are not.

How this was computed

Data used: most recent value in 2010-2025; values come from 2021–2025. To adjust for income, each measure is first predicted from GDP per person (in percentage terms, on a log scale) with a straight-line fit. Only what is left over is then compared. This is called a partial correlation. The line is drawn the standard way (ordinary least squares), which picks the line that comes closest to all the countries at once. The error margins allow for countries in the same region resembling each other, using 7 World Bank regions. The q-value corrects for testing all 12,497 pairs at once, using the Benjamini–Hochberg method. Underlying data last updated DYB 2024. How the country data works · explore Tuberculosis incidence and Vulnerable employment

This page shows that two measures go together. It does not show that Tuberculosis incidence changes Vulnerable employment, or the reverse. These figures also describe countries, not individual people. See the ecological fallacy.

More links with Tuberculosis incidence or Vulnerable employment