Contrary to the rising economic distress on the ground since the last few years, the official press release related to the fourth Annual Report on the Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) at first glance seems to give a rosy picture about the employment situation in India.  Defined as the percentage of persons unemployed among the persons in the labour force, the unemployment rate in usual status (principal activity status + subsidiary economic activity status)...

-Deccan Herald The triumvirate of structural, cyclical and policy implementation challenges all have a role to play in this undesirable outcome While India’s unemployment challenge has assumed a worrying proportion and is now being looked at as the most important headwind for the prospect of post-pandemic economic recovery, it was a long time in the making. The triumvirate of structural, cyclical and policy implementation challenges all have a role to play in this...

-Livemint.com The RBI will face the difficult choice of either intervening strongly to ‘manage volatility’ at the risk of losing reserves or letting the currency ‘find its own level’. India’s ministry of finance struck an upbeat note in its August economic review when it asserted growth is “robust" and inflation is “under control". It then quite rightly balanced the optimism with the qualification “there is no room for complacency". Truth be told,...

-Press release by Oxfam India dated 15 September 2022 New Delhi: Oxfam India’s latest ‘India Discrimination Report 2022’ finds women in India despite their same educational qualification and work experience as men will be discriminated in the labour market due to societal and employers’ prejudices. The academically recognised statistical model applied in the India Discrimination Report is now able to quantify the discrimination women face in the labour market. The lower...

-The Hindu Growth impulses also need to be ‘unfettered’ in current situation, says Sitharaman In a barely veiled signal to Mint Street, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Thursday that monetary policy tools like interest rate increases deployed by several central banks would not suffice to cool inflation and suggested that the Reserve Bank of India need not synchronise its actions ‘as much’ with its counterparts in developed countries.  While monetary policy as...