Costa Rica has a largely educated population with a nearly 95 percent literacy rate, which means employers have a qualified pool to draw from. Both males and females average 12 years of education, after which they aim to gain employment. To manage the labor market, Costa Rica has set labor laws to keep out unfair practices as much as possible.
Costa Rican law requires one day vacation after every one month of employment. Respectively, two weeks of vacation are due after fifty weeks of work. These vacations can't be on weekends or paid holidays but must land on regularly scheduled days of work. The employer, not the employee, gets to choose when the vacations are taken.
Registered employees partake in a social security program, or a Caja Costarricense del Seguro Social CCSS. In this program, the employer pays 25 percent of the total salaried amount to be put into social security, while the employee pays an additional 9 percent. This fund covers the employee for medical care, general medical costs and hospitalization. In addition, 3 percent of this amount is put into a pension, or savings fund, for the employee.
Costa Rica has several paid holidays. These include January 1st, Easter Thursday and the Friday that follows it, April 11, May 1, July 25, Aug. 15, Sept. 15th and Dec. 25.
If an employee is fired without fair cause then aguinaldo (Christmas bonus), vacation pay, and notice and termination pay are required to be paid to them. If an employee quits or is fired for an understandable reason, vacation pay and aguinaldo must still be paid to the employee. The law states that 30-day notice must be given to an employee that will be terminated, and if this is not provided the employee is entitled to 30 days of pay.
Special laws apply to live-in domestic employees such as cooks, maids and servers. The minimum wage is much less for domestic workers and the workday is 12 hours, with some provisions allowing for 16-hour workday. With the 12-hour workday comes with designated mealtimes as well as a one-hour rest. The domestic employee does not receive the same vacation pay and benefits and is entitled only to one half day off per week as well as a half day off on paid holidays.
