The unemployment rate sees no major changes at 3.2% in the year ending in June 2024. The Periodic Labour Force Survey report presented on Monday, September 23 by the Labour Bureau noted the stagnation. At the same time, unemployment among women climbed up to 3.2% from 2.9% in the previous year. While the unemployment for the urban population decreased by 0.3% from 5.4% to 5.1%, it increased for the rural population by 0.1% from 2.4% to 2.5%.

According to the data, male and female labour force participation increased to a seven-year high. The Labour Force Participation Rate (LFPR) of persons of 15 years and above was 60.1%, the same for was 78.8% and female was 41.7%. While LFPR for rural areas was 63.7% and that % for urban areas was 52%. LFPR is the percentage of people available for work among the entire population.  

The LFPR for Muslim women increased from 15% in 2021-22 to 21.4% in 2023-24. Similarly, for Hindu, Christian and Sikh LFPR changed from 26.1% to 33.3%, 19.8% to 26.7% and 34.2% to 38.3% respectively for the same period.

Worker Population Ratio also saw an upward surge. In rural areas, it increased from 46.8% in 2017-18 to 58.2% in 2023-24. The unemployment rate became half in seven years. It decreased from 6.0% in 2017-18 to 3.2%. But compared to the previous year it remained unchanged. The unemployment rate for rural women changed from 1.8% to 2.1% and urban women changed which resulted in an overall increase in the unemployment rate among women from 2.9% to 3.2% in the same period.

According to the report, the number of households surveyed was 1.01 lakh and the number of persons surveyed was 4.18 lakh.

Experts interpret the survey as a gloomy scenario for employment. “There is no improvement in the unemployment scenario, neither in youth unemployment nor in overall unemployment,” said Labour Economist Prof. Santosh Mehrotra to the Hindu. “It is because of the increase in workers in agriculture. This also means that unpaid family labour has also increased and the PLFS counts this unpaid family labour as employment. The participation of workers in agriculture share has gone up for the fourth year in a row. This is shocking,”. Prof Mehrotra points out that participation in manufacturing and construction work has gone down. This contributes to a significant chunk of rural employment for women.