The government has a plan to reach welfare to the poor without wasting money. It wants to put hard cash in their hands instead of spending on welfare programmes. To begin with, it wants to end the public distribution system of food grain and give money directly to the people. Its logic: the new system of cash transfer will plug leakages and save an enormous amount of money. But is it...

Incidence of 'vulnerable employment' is highest in South Asia, including India, with 580 million people in the region falling under the category, says the annual Global Employment Trends report of the International Labour Organisation. People in the vulnerable employment category in the region are saddled with low wages and little social protection, said the report. In fact, the whole of Asia Pacific region had a comparatively higher level of vulnerable employment...

As world leaders and wealthy business executives prepared to mingle and chat at the World Economic Forum , U.N. figures revealed Tuesday that 205 million people were Unemployed last year in the wake of the financial crisis and that little improvement was expected in 2011. The International Labor Organization said the number of jobless worldwide held steady last year and is forecast to dip less than 1 per cent this year...

Despite a sharp rebound in economic growth for many countries, global unemployment in 2011 is likely to continue at the record highs of the past three years, highlighting the need for long-term policies that prioritize quality job creation, according to the United Nations labour agency. Moreover, a narrow focus in developed economies on reducing fiscal deficits without addressing the challenge of job creation will further weaken employment prospects in 2011, the...

‘The least that every worker in field and factory is entitled to is a minimum wage which will enable him to live in modest comfort, and humane hours of labour which do not break his strength or spirit...,’ Jawaharlal Nehru declared stirringly in his presidential address to Congress in Lahore in 1929. Eight decades later, the Union government of free India resolved that it would not pay the minimum wage...