India’s job crisis

UNEMPLOYMENT is weighing India down, with the country’s youth accounting for almost 83 per cent of the unemployed workforce, according to the India Employment Report 2024 published jointly by the International Labour Organisation and the Institute of Human Development. As per the report, the proportion of jobless youth with at least secondary education rose to 65.7 per cent in 2022. The findings have cast a cloud on India’s capacity to reap the demographic dividend; young people constituted 27 per cent of the nation’s population in 2021.

The report states that the labour force participation rate, the worker population ratio (the number of employed people per thousand citizens) and the unemployment rate witnessed a long-term deterioration between 2000 and 2018, but there was an improvement after 2019. The turnaround coincided with periods of economic distress, both before and after the Covid-19 pandemic, with the exception of two peak Covid quarters. However, the authors of the report have said that this improvement needs to be ‘interpreted cautiously’ as jobs generated in the slowdown period raise questions about the ‘drivers of these changes’.

The world’s most populous nation, which is also the fastest-growing major economy, cannot afford to ignore youth employment. The government and the industry need to work in close coordination to rein in joblessness. Chief Economic Adviser V Anantha Nageswaran has put the onus on the industry to hire more people, saying that it is incorrect to think that government intervention can solve every social or economic problem. Nevertheless, policymakers have a key role to play in shaping schemes that can spur skill development and employment generation. No less important than the quantity of employment is its quality. The robust growth in manufacturing, services and construction sectors should guide stakeholders to optimally use the skills of India’s educated youth.

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