Vendors argue with taskforce over a bid to demolish a marketplace less than a year old around the Mebrat Hail condominium. Both the Addis Abeba City Administration and newly formed Sheger City authorities have launched an unrelenting campaign to remove housing projects deemed to have been built without permits. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimates that about 60pc of the global workforce works in the informal sector, with Ethiopia's informal economy accounting for 35pc of its GDP. The little over 800 billion Br austere federal budget announced a week ago along with looming tax increments and decreased capital projects, has cast gloomy clouds over the lower middle class. While the federal government maintains an inflation rate of 33pc, several economists calculate it to be close to 64pc further diminishing the purchasing power of cash on which many in the informal sector rely.

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