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More Women Are Out of Work, Reveals Govt Report -Subodh Varma

-Newsclick.in

Women’s work participation has dramatically declined, unemployment is at an all-time high and they often get half the wage of what men get for same work, shows the latest labour force survey report.

The recently released Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) for 2017-18 reveals a striking decline in women’s participation in the workforce. Only about 22% of women of working age (defined as 15 years of age or more) were gainfully employed, down from about 31% in 2011-12, as estimated by the 68th Round of National Sample Survey Organisation survey. Workforce participation has been continuously declining in India (see chart below) and the latest level is nearly half of what it was in 2004-05. This is one of the lowest work participation rates in the world.

These latest estimates are for what is called the ‘usual status (principal+subsidiary)’ which means that any woman who worked for a large part of the preceding year in an occupation as well as those who worked in subsidiary occupations (for more than 30 days in the year) are included as employed. This is a rather nebulous definition and includes a large number of under-employed women. Despite that, the remarkably small share of women in work highlights the deteriorating problem of women’s employment in the country. No government, whether the current one in its previous tenure or earlier ones, have seriously addressed this tragic situation.

So, what are the rest of the women doing? The bulk of them are no longer in the labour force, that is, they are not seeking jobs. They confine themselves to domestic duties, which in India include such drudgery as collecting firewood or fetching water, as also looking after cattle. Needless to say, that they also do all the care work at home. Another factor limiting women’s work participation is the patriarchal ideas that still dominate India’s families which do not approve of women going out of the home for remunerative work.

This does not mean that these home-bound women are all unwilling to work or the family does not need them to work. As the chart below shows, women’s unemployment, that is, the share of women who are seeking work but are unable to find it, has increased precipitously in the past few years.

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