26 September 2018

Jobs, Wages and Employment in India

Key features of jobs, wages and employment in India*:
1. Growth creates fewer jobs than it used to.
- A 10% increase in GDP now results in less than 1% increase in employment.
- Unemployment among the youth and higher educated has reached 16%.
2. Wages are rising but they are below the 7th Pay Commission's minimum.
- Wage rates have grown in most sectors at 3% per year or more.
- 82% of male and 92% of female workers earn less than ₹10,000 a month.
3. Replacement of workers by machines has slowed down.
- ₹ 1 crore of fixed capital in organised manufacturing supports 10 jobs.
- Contract workers are nearly 30% of all workers in organised manufacturing.
4. Productivity has increasingly diverged from wages.
- Labour productivity in organised manufacturing increased by 6 times over the past 30 years, but wages increased by only 1.5 times.
5. 'Surplus Labour' industries still dominate as 'new' service economy grows slowly.
- 'Surplus labour' based industries account for more than 50% of service sector employment.
6. Gender disparities are still high but are reducing in some cases.
- Women are 16% of all service sector workers but 60% of domestic workers.
- Women earn 65% of men's earnings.
7. Women's participation in the paid workforce is low but some states perform much better than others.
- While only 20 women are in paid employment for every 100 men in UP, this number is 50 in Tamil Nadu and 70 in the North East.
- Government programs are crucial.
8. Caste disparities are large but government policy is reducing them.
- Scheduled castes are 18.5% of all workers but 46% of leather workers.
- Caste earnings gap is larger than gender earnings gap.
9. Crafts remain big employers and are central to the rural non-farm economy.
- With over 500 officially listed arts and crafts, the sector represents immense cultural value, ecological positives and crores of jobs.

*Source: "State of Working in India 2018" (PDF) by Centre for Sustainable Employment, Azim Premji University.

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