India’s unemployment rate stood at 5.1% in July, a slight decrease from 5.2% in the same month last year. However, the unemployment rate for individuals aged 15 to 29 rose by 0.70 percentage points, raising concerns amid recent protests by Gen Z across the country. Notably, this increase occurred despite a stable labour force participation rate in this age group, indicating deeper issues in youth employment.
The numbers are from Periodic Labour Force Survey (PLFS) data released by the National Statistics Office (NSO) on Monday. The headline number is in keeping with the marginal decline seen in unemployment rate in May and June. To be sure, the trend in unemployment was opposite for men and women; rural and urban areas; and the young and old.
Unemployment rate increased by 10 basis points – one basis point is one hundredth of a percentage point — compared to last year in rural areas to 4.5%. In urban areas, the rate decreased by 50 basis points to 6.7%.
To be sure, sequentially, unemployment rate fell for even the young and women. However, labour market indicators are usually compared for the same month across years to account for seasonality of jobs, such as those in agriculture. Similarly, a gender-wise disaggregation shows that female unemployment increased 30 basis points to 5.4% while male unemployment decreased by 30 basis points to 5%. Youth unemployment – the monthly bulletins give disaggregated data only for the 15-29 age group – also increased by 70 basis points to 15.6%.
