This paper examines the perception of construction workers in a context of social vulnerability, marked by the increasing precariousness of employment contracts. Twenty workers from São Carlos (Brazil) were interviewed, recovering their trajectories of work. Through qualitative analysis of the interviews, it was possible to verify the vulnerability and varied forms of employment contracts and remuneration. Despite the precariousness of labor relations, half of the workers claim to be professionally fulfilled in their occupation, while the other half perceive themselves to be diminished in society by the lack of schooling, or identify themselves with former occupations, seeing construction as a passing step or as the last option left to them.
flexible labor; vulnerability; employment contracts; workers' perception; building construction