Since the pandemic, the unemployment rate in India is rising at a fast pace. If we talk about the recent reports then according to The Economic Times, India has 53 million unemployed people as of December 2021 and a huge proportion of them are women. The Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy said out of 53 million, 36 million are unemployed of which 8 million are women who are actively seeking work while 17 million are those who, though willing to work but are not actively seeking it from which 9 million are women. According to the reports, the current average unemployment rate as of 15th February 2022 of the past 30 days is 7.6% of whole India, in urban 7.7% and in rural it is 7.5%.
What is Unemployment?
Unemployment occurs when a person is actively looking for employment but is unable to find work. Unemployment is estimated by calculating the unemployment rate. The main reason for calculating the unemployment rate is to calculate the health of the economy.
Unemployment rate = (Unemployed Workers/ Total labour force) × 100
The (NSSO) National sample Survey Organisation defined an unemployed person as an individual who is seeking or available for work and employed as an individual who is engaged in economic activity.
Types of unemployment in India
The main types of unemployment in India are the following:
- Seasonal unemployment – It occurs only during certain seasons of the year. This type of unemployment is mainly known to observe in the agricultural sector.
- Structural unemployment – This type of unemployment is observed highly in India it occurs when the jobs available in the market do not match with the skills of workers available in the market.
- Technological unemployment – This type of unemployment occurs due to changes in technology.
- Vulnerable unemployment – This is one of the main types of unemployment, especially in India. This type of unemployment occurs when an individual works without any proper job contract. This is considered unemployment as their work records are not maintained.
- Frictional unemployment – This is also known as search unemployment. It occurs when an individual is searching for a new job, that time lag between the jobs is known as frictional unemployment.
Measures that can be taken to reduce the rate of unemployment –
- Decentralisation of Industries – For providing employment to everyone the Decentralisation of industrial activities is important also the development of rural areas is important as it will mitigate the migration of the rural people to the urban areas to decrease the pressure on the urban area jobs.
- Adopting the Labour-intensive industries – India has various labour-intensive manufacturing sectors like food processing, wood manufacturers, garments, etc. So it is required to create jobs for all of these sectors to generate employment.
- Rural Development schemes – Introducing rural development schemes is important as in rural areas the basic occupational sector of people is agriculture.
- Promoting the Small enterprises – Small-scale industries should be given the topmost priority to generate the scope for self-employment. They should be provided infrastructure, training facilities, and market facilities as well.